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BURT  FRANKLIN  RESEARCH  AND  SOURCE  WORKS  SERIES  No.  43 


THE 

CAMERALISTS 


THE 

CAMERALISTS 

THE  PIONEERS  OF  GERMAN 
SOCIAL  POLITY 


BT 

ALBION  W.  SMALL 


BURT  FRANKLIN  RESEARCH  AND  SOURCE  WORKS  SERIES  No.  43 


BURT  FRANKLIN 
New  York  25,  N.  Y. 


Published  by 

BURT  FRANKLIN 

514  West  113th  Street 

New  York  25,  N.  Y. 


First  Published 

Chicago  1909 


PRINTED  IN  U.S.A. 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Preface vii 

CHAPTEK 

I.    Introduction  to  Cameralism     .......  i 

n.    The  Civics  of  Osse 21 

m.    The  Civics  of  Obrecht 40 

rV.    The  Cameralistics  of  Seckendorff    ....  60 

V.    The  Cameralistics  of  Becher 107 

VI.    The  Cameralistics  of  Schroder 135 

VII.    The  Cameralistics  of  Gerhard 175 

VIII.    The  Cameralistics  of  Rohr 185 

DC.    The  Cameralistics  of  Gasser  ....     i     .  206 

X.    The  Cameralistics  of  Dithmar 222 

XI.    The  Cameralistics  of  Zincke 232 

XII.    The  Cameralistics  of  Darjes 267 

XIII.    The  Cameralistics  of  Justi 285 

Xrv.    The  Argument  OF  JusTi's  "St aatswirthschaft"  3x5 

XV.    JusTi's  Political  Philosophy 394 

XVI.    JusTi's  **  Police ywissenschaft" 436 

XVII.    JusTi's  Cameralistic  Miscellanies      ....  459 
XVIII.    The  Cameralistics  of  Sonnenfels — "Introduc- 
tion"        48. 

XIX.    The  Cameralistics  of  Sonnenfels  — "Police y"  505 
XX.    The    Cameralistics   of    Sonnenfels  —  "Hand- 
lung"     525 

XXI.    The   Cameralistics   of    Sonnenfels  —  "Hand- 
lung  UND  FiNANz'  542 

XXII.    Summary 586 

Index 597 


PREFACE 

Like  its  predecessor  in  this  series,  Adam  Smith  and  Modern 
Sociology,  the  present  book  is  a  mere  fragment.  It  deals  with 
a  single  factor  of  the  social  process  in  the  German  States.  It 
finds  this  factor  already  effective  in  1555.  It  dt)es  not  attempt 
to  trace  each  link  in  the  chain  of  continuity  from  that  date. 
It  reviews  the  most  important  seventeenth-century  writers  in 
the  line  of  sequence,  but  the  emphasis  of  the  book  falls  in  the 
eighteenth  century.  I  have  carefully  excluded  the  problem  of 
relations  between  this  literary  factor  and  other  social  elements, 
and  I  have  purposely  refrained  from  estimating  its  ratio  of 
importance  among  the  formative  forces  of  the  period.  Con- 
clusions of  that  order  must  come  from  a  larger  synthesis,  for 
which  the  present  study  supplies  merely  a  detail. 

To  justify  my  belief  that  the  labor  which  this  book  cost 
was  well  spent,  it  would  be  necessary  to  prove  first,  that  Amer- 
icans have  much  to  gain  from  better  understanding  of  the 
Germans;  and  second,  that  just  appreciation  of  the  present 
social  system  of  the  Germans  is  impossible  for  Americans  unless 
they  are  willing  to  trace  it  historically.  These  propositions 
must  be  left,  however,  without  the  support  of  argument,  merely 
as  the  author's  profession  of  faith. 

To  readers  of  English  only,  cameralism  is  virtually  a  lost 
chapter  in  the  history  of  the  social  sciences.  Although  ever>'- 
thing  now  belonging  to  German  polity  has  a  part  of  its  heredity 
in  that  type  of  social  theory,  not  every  rej^utable  student  of 
the  social  sciences  in  America  could  correctly  define  the  term, 
and  few  could  name  more  than  one  or  two  writers  to  whom 
it  is  j)roperly  applied. 

In  a  word,  the  cameralists  were  a  series  of  German  writers, 
from  the  middle  of  the  sixteenth  to  the  end  of  the  eighteenth 


VUl  THE  CAMERALISTS 

century,  who  approached  civic  problems  from  a  common  view- 
point, who  proposed  the  same  central  question,  and  who  devel- 
oped a  coherent  civic  theory,  corresponding  with  the  German 
system  of  administration  at  the  same  time  in  course  of  evolution. 
To  the  cameralists  the  central  problem  of  science  was  the 
problem  of  the  state.  To  them  the  object  of  all  social  theory 
was  to  show  how  the  welfare  of  the  state  might  be  secured. 
They  saw  in  the  welfare  of  the  state  the  source  of  all  other 
welfare.  Their  key  to  the  welfare  of  the  state  was  revenue 
to  supply  the  needs  of  the  state.  Their  whole  social  theory 
radiated  from  the  central  task  of  furnishing  the  state  with 
ready  means. 

For  reasons  to  be  mentioned  later,  allusions  to  the  cameral- 
ists in  English  books,  whether  original  or  translated,  are  more 
frequent  among  the  economists  than  elsewhere.  If,  however, 
we  consult  the  two  handbooks  of  the  history  of  economic  theory 
in  most  frequent  use  by  students  in  this  country,  we  find  that 
they  barely  allude  to  cameralism,  and  their  historical  perspec- 
tive would  be  clearer  if  they  did  not  mention  the  subject  at 
all.  In  the  second  edition  of  Cossa,^  Klock,  Becher,  Homigk 
{sic)f  and  Schroder  are  disposed  of  in  a  paragraph  of  about 
seventy  words,  and  another  paragraph  two  lines  longer,  in 
the  chapter  on  the  physiocrats  (!),  mentions  the  "Chamber  Sci- 
ences," as  represented  by  Justi  and  Sonnenfels  only.  The  third 
edition  of  the  same  book,  or  the  volume  which  took  the  place 
of  a  third  edition,  translated  under  the  title  An  Introduction 
to  the  Study  of  Political  Economy,  mentions  the  same  three 
Austrians,  and  adds  a  couple  of  lines  on  Seckendorff  in  the 
section  on  "Industrial  Freedom;"  it  mentions  Gasser,  Dithmar, 
and  Darjes  in  the  section  on  "Professional  Chairs,  Newspapers, 
and  Academies;"  it  gives  a  paragraph  each  to  Justi  and  Son- 

'  Translated  under  the  supervision  of  Jevons,  with  the  title,  Guide 
to  the  Study  of  Political  Economy;  original  first  edition,  1876,  second, 
1878,  translation,  1880. 


PREFACE  IX 

nenfels,  in  the  section  entitled  "Bureaucratic  and  Professorial 
Eclecticism;"  and  then,  after  a  few  statements  thirty-four 
pages  later,  about  the  "German  Physiocrats,"  it  for  the  first 
time  finds  its  bearings  among  German  thinkers  with  Rau,  who 
began  to  write  a  generation  after  cameralism  in  the  strict  sense 
had  passed  its  prime.  Ingram  evidently  abstracted  from 
Roscher,  by  some  principle  of  selection  which  does  not  appear, 
a  dozen  names  of  German  "mercantilists"  of  the  cameralistic 
period.  The  summary  way  in  which  he  disposes  of  them 
shows  that  he  had  no  first-hand  knowledge  of  these  writers,  and 
that  he  utterly  misapprehended  their  place  in  the  history  of 
German  thought.  If  one  were  so  fortunate  as  to  learn  the 
names  of  the  cameralists,  and  turned  to  Palgrave  for  more 
information,  little  would  be  found  beyond  repetition  of  scraps 
gathered  from  Roscher;  and  these  so  disconnected  that 
they  would  hardly  pique  curiosity  to  pry  farther.  All  the 
other  English  aids  to  knowledge  of  cameralism  are  so  scattered 
that  an  adequate  introduction  to  the  subject  by  means  of  them 
would  be  out  of  the  question. 

During  the  last  generation,  American  readers  of  German 
appear  to  have  relied,  as  a  rule,  for  information  about  early 
phases  of  German  economic  thought,  chiefly  upon  two  writers, 
Kautz^  and  Roscher.' 

Of  Kautz  it  is  enough  to  say  that  he  was  of  the  rear  guard 
of  the  rhetoricians.  His  book  is  wonderfully  plausible  if  not 
lucid  reading.  Its  early  pages  appear  to  express  methodiv 
logical  conclusions  which  the  maturest  scholarship  has  not 
superseded.  Unfortunately,  the  author's  own  procedure,  as 
it  appears  in  the  body  of  the  book,  shows  that  for  him  these 

'  Julius  Kautz,  Die  geschichtliche  Enhvickelung  der  National- 
Oekonomik  und  ihrer  Literaiur,  Wien,  i860. 

'  Wilhelm  Roscher,  Geschichte  der  National-Oekonomik  in  Deutsch- 
land,  Miinchen,  1874.  In  the  following  pages,  if  nothing  appears  to 
the  contrary,  this  work  is  referred  to  whenever  the  author's  name  is  used. 


X  THE  CAMERALISTS 

imposing  propositions  had  merely  the  force  of  impotent  general- 
ities. His  actual  method  is  first,  derivation,  by  some  occult 
means,  of  certain  general  principles  under  which  to  subsume 
the  economists  of  the  period;  then,  second,  use  of  the  writers 
of  the  period  as  so  many  illustrations  of  the  principles.  When 
projected  upon  this  vicious  circle,  the  course  of  thought  in 
successive  stages  falls  into  alluring  symmetry.  A  little  inquiry 
into  the  facts,  however,  shows  that  these  pleasing  constructions 
are  mainly  fictitious. 

For  example,  Kautz  locates  the  second  of  his  three  great 
divisions  of  economic  ideas  "between  the  end  of  the  Middle 
Ages  and  Adam  Smith."  This  second  period  he  interprets 
as  that  of  independent  investigation,  "in  which  the  national- 
economic  ideas  and  principles  were  no  longer  mixed  and  com- 
bined with  the  political,  legal,  and  religious  systems  of  theory, 
but  were  presented  as  a  totality  of  peculiar  special  cognitions."* 
The  truth  of  this  generalization  depends  upon  the  standard 
used  for  measurement  of  relative  bondage  to  conventionality 
and  independence  of  it.  Compared  with  the  age  of  the  school- 
men the  period  from  Martin  Luther  to  Adam  Smith  was  of 
course  intellectually  free.  On  the  other  hand,  if  contempo- 
raries of  Kautz  had  gone  back  to  the  economic  and  political 
theorists  of  the  intermediate  period,  with  no  preparation  but 
nineteenth-century  ideas,  they  would  have  been  amazed  at 
the  degree  in  which  social  thinking  of  all  sorts  was  paralyzed 
by  dogmatic  prepossessions.  Even  if  Kautz's  generalization 
had  been  qualified  in  a  way  to  make  it  valid,  use  of  it  as  a 
premise  from  which  to  deduce  interpretation  of  the  economic 
theories  of  the  period  was  like  finding  a  sufficient  explanation 
of  the  course  of  American  experience  since  1776  in  terms  of 
the  mere  negative  condition  of  independence  from  England. 
Anyone  who  can  have  patience  with  discursive  essays  upon 
long-distance  impressions  of  the  development  of  economic 

»  Loc.  cit.,  p.  25. 


I'REFACK  XI 

theory  would  find  Kautz  impressive.  As  a  guide  to  critical 
study  of  the  actual  process  he  is  impossible. 

Whatever  our  estimate,  on  the  other  hand,  of  the  "histori- 
cal school,"  and  of  Roscher's  contributions  to  economic  theory, 
there  can  be  no  doubt  about  the  value  of  his  services  to  economic 
history.  The  volume  cited  above,  on  the  history  of  economic 
theory  in  Germany,  has  served  as  an  almost  unchallenged 
authority  on  the  subject  for  a  generation.  Those  who  have 
had  most  occasion  to  work  in  the  field  which  this  book  surveys 
will  be  most  sincere  in  their  gratitude  to  the  author.  The 
present  volume  could  surely  not  have  been  written  if  Roscher 
had  not  blazed  the  way. 

Nevertheless,  the  farther  I  went  in  the  studies  which  this 
book  reports,  the  more  my  wonder  grew  that  German  scholar- 
ship had  not  yet  produced  a  work  which  would  be  as  evident 
an  advance  upon  Roscher  as  he  was  upon  Kautz.  For  obvious 
reasons  such  a  book  must  be  written  in  Germany.  At  the 
same  time,  comparison  of  the  perspective  of  foreign  scholars 
may  be  worth  something  as  an  aid  in  establishing  the  viewpoint 
from  which  the  evolution  of  German  social  theories  should  be 
reconsidered. 

It  is  approximately  true  that  knowledge  of  the  cameralists 
as  a  group  has  remained  as  it  was  left  by  Roscher.  The  most 
general  thesis  of  the  present  work  is  that  the  cameralists  have 
not  yet  come  to  their  own  in  the  assignment  of  historical  values. 
In  other  words,  while  acknowledging  my  debt  to  Roscher,  I 
find  it  necessary  to  impeach  his  authority. 

In  the  first  i)lace,  Roscher  was  essentially  a  collector,  not  an 
interj)reter.  Yet,  although  his  chief  merit  was  as  an  assembler 
of  details,  I  have  still  been  surprised  at  the  number  of  times 
in  which  I  have  found  him  apj)arently  in  error  about  matters 
of  fact.  It  was  not  my  affair  to  find  out  whether  these  slips 
were  more  his  fault  or  his  misfortune.  At  his  time  the  evi- 
dence which  would  have  corrected  the  errors  of  detail  may 


Ml  THE  CAMERALISTS 

not  have  l)e€n  accessil)lc.  At  all  events,  the  writers  in  DU 
allgemeine  deutsche  Biographic  almost  invarial)ly  justify  more 
or  less  important  modifications  in  Roscher's  accounts  of  the 
individual  careers  of  the  cameralists.  My  own  study  of  these 
writers  has  l>een  confined  to  their  books.  For  such  hiograf)hical 
introduction  as  was  necessary  I  have  relied  throu«;houi,  unless 
exception  is  noted,  upon  the  work  just  named,  whenever  it 
differed  from  Roscher. 

But  the  chief  issue  with  Roscher  is  much  more  radical. 
For  a  generation  the  world's  interpretation  of  the  cameralists 
has  virtually  been  stereotyped  in  the  form  which  he  cast.  The 
more  s|)ccific  thesis  of  the  present  w(»rk  is  that  his  version  of 
the  cameralists  utterly  misses  their  real  meaninsi;.  It  is  a  blur 
prrnluced  by  a  comi)ination  of  methodological  fallacy  and 
historical  nearsightedness.  German  scholars  alone  are  within 
reach  of  the  means  fully  to  reconstruct  the  history  if  the  thesis 
is  sustained.  I  hope  I  am  right,  however,  that  the  very  dis- 
tance from  the  bulk  of  the  sources,  which  compels  attention 
to  the  main  movement  of  thought,  confers  a  distinct  advantage 
in  making  out  the  larger  meanings  of  the  body  of  literature  in 
question. 

In  order  to  justify  this  challenge  of  venerable  tra<lition, 
account  must  be  taken  of  the  immediate  antecedents  of  Rosi  her's 
b(K)k.  In  1858  Leopold  Ranke  submitted  to  the  Bavarian 
Royal  Academy  of  Sciences  a  |)lan  for  a  series  of  twenty-four 
volumes  on  the  history  of  the  sciences  in  (iermany.  The  sub- 
jects of  those  volumes  in  the  series  which  are  most  intimately 
related  to  the  present  issue  are:  (i)  Gesrhirhte;  (2)  Kriegs- 
wissensrhajl;  (3)  Jurisprudenz;  (4)  Allgemeincs  Staalsredil 
und  I'olitik;  (5)  N ationalokonomie  und  kaniercUistisrhe  I'diher; 
{())  iMndivirthsrhajtslehre.  For  the  convenience  of  the  writers 
available,  and  iur  facility  of  p(jpular  expr>sition,  these  subdivi- 
sions were  doubtless  more  suitable  than  any  others  that  might 
have  been  [)rofM>sed.     As  a  j)rogramme  for  (ritical  rosea n  h. 


PREFACE  xiil 

however,  the  standards  of  today  being  the  criterion,  that  divi- 
sion of  labor  surrendered  the  work  in  advance  to  preconception 
and  misconstruction.  A  precisely  analogous  fallacy  would 
be  involved  in  a  scheme  today  to  parcel  out  among  different 
scholars,  in  accordance  with  present  national  boundaries,  an 
analysis  of  the  political  conditions  of  Europe  at  the  time  of 
Charlemagne.  The  political  map  of  Europe  in  the  ninth 
century  was  not  as  it  is  today,  and  analysis  based  on  the  con- 
trary assumption  would  deserve  rejection  without  a  hearing. 
But  the  inchoate  social  sciences,  from  the  middle  of  the  sixteenth 
century  to  the  end  of  the  eighteenth,  were  no  more  homogeneous 
and  coterminous  with  scientific  categories  at  the  middle  of  the 
nineteenth  century  than  national  frontiers  of  the  ninth  century 
retain  their  places  in  the  twentieth.  In  other  words,  the 
Bavarian  Academy  did  not  undertake  to  find  the  centers  in 
the  past  from  which  the  evolution  of  the  social  sciences  could 
be  traced  step  by  step  and  process  by  process.  On  the  con- 
trary, it  sponsored  a  plan  which  called  for  a  conventionalizing 
of  previous  centuries  in  terms  of  nineteenth-century  classifica- 
tion. This  scheme  ruthlessly  inverted  the  rule  which  had 
been  the  first  great  historiographical  commandment  with 
promise  since  Savigny  and  Niebuhr. 

The  result  was  a  conspicuous  vindication  of  the  violated 
principle.  The  sort  of  analysis  which  the  present  volume 
reports  very  early  unearths  the  fact  that  the  conventional  divi- 
sion of  labor  in  the  series  threw  the  data  out  of  their  relations 
and  retarded  discovery  of  their  meaning.  In  particular  it 
assigned  the  cameralists  to  Roscher,'  while  it  estopped  analysis 
of  them  at  their  proper  center  within  the  scope  of  Bluntschli.* 
Using  the  terms  in  the  sense  in  which  they  are  understood  in 
the  United  States  today,  the  cameralists  were  not  primarily 
economists.     They  were  primarily  political  scientists.     This 

»  Under  title  (5)  above. 

» Title  (4)  above. 


XIV  THE  CAMERALISTS 

single  perception  demonstrates  the  unreliability  of  both  Roscher 
and  Bluntschli  upon  the  cardinal  question  of  the  meaning  of 
the  cameralists  for  the  evolution  of  the  sciences  in  Germany. 
The  first  critical  question  to  be  answered  in  an  interpretation 
of  the  cameralists  is:  What  was  their  specific  purpose,  the 
center  from  which  they  proceeded,  the  interest  which  gave  the 
respective  ratings  to  all  their  other  interests  ?  Rarely  is  this 
question  answered  as  promptly  and  as  decisively  as  in  the  case 
of  the  cameralists.  The  answer  exhibits  in  cameralism  the 
germination,  not  of  an  academic  abstraction,  but  of  a  whole 
civic  polity. 

Turning  to  the  defect  of  historical  nearsightedness,  a  typical 
symptom  may  be  taken  from  Bluntschli.'     He  says: 

The  Germans  applied  their  attention  tardily  to  general  civic 
science  (Staatswissenschaft).  In  the  sixteenth  century  Italians  and 
Frenchmen,  in  the  seventeenth  Dutchmen  and  Englishmen,  and 
in  the  eighteenth  Englishmen  and  Frenchmen  were  far  in  advance. 
Only  by  degrees  did  the  Germans  overtake  these  leaders,  and  pres- 
ently it  was  their  fortune,  through  diligence  and  thoroughness  of 
investigation,  through  moral  earnestness  of  endeavor,  and  through 
the  loftiness  of  their  standpoint  and  the  energy  of  their  thinking,  to 
equal  the  foremost  and  to  win  general  recognition. 

In  a  certain  sense  the  first  two  of  these  propositions  are  as 
true  as  the  last.  At  the  same  time,  this  conventional  judgment 
is  in  large  part  a  mere  survival  of  that  obsession  which  filled 
Germany,  and  to  a  certain  extent  the  rest  of  Europe,  during 
the  eighteenth  century,  with  awe  and  fear  of  everything  political 
made  in  France.  In  effect  Bluntschli  follows  Weitzel'  in  can- 
celing the  cameralists  from  the  account,  while  he  discusses 
other  Germans  of  much  less  real  importance  for  civic  science. 
Von  Mohl  had  meanwhile  written, 3  and  had  really  given  the 

•  Loc.  cit.,  p.  xiv. 

'  Geschichte  der  Staalrivissenschajt,  2  vols.,  1832-33. 

i  Geschichte  und  Literatur  der  Staalswissenschajten,  3  vols.,  1855-58. 


PREFACE  XV 

cameralists  more  credit  than  Bluntschli  allows,  though  he  does 
not  in  principle  vary  from  tradition.  It  is  not  necessary,  if 
it  were  possible,  to  cloud  the  title  of  other  countries  to  respect 
for  their  achievements  in  the  political  sciences.  My  conten- 
tion is  that  the  Germans  were  not  as  sterile  in  this  field  as  it 
has  been  their  own  fashion  to  suppose.  In  fact  there  was  no 
more  virile  political  thinking  in  Europe  in  the  seventeenth 
and  eighteenth  centuries  than  that  of  the  German  cameralists. 
I  do  not  say  that  it  was  as  profound,  as  abstract,  as  highly 
generalized,  as  political  works  of  the  first  rank  jjroduced  by 
other  nations.  It  was  suited  to  the  occasions  which  set  its 
task.  It  was  constructive.  It  was  effective.  As  in  the  case 
of  all  theory,  in  comparison  with  its  practical  counterpart,  it 
is  impossible  to  demonstrate  how  much  the  cameralism  of  the 
books  was  cause  and  how  much  effect  of  the  cameralism  of 
the  bureaus.  I  do  not  raise  that  question.  The  same  dilemma 
is  at  least  as  pertinent  to  Grotius  or  Locke  or  Montesquieu 
as  to  the  cameralists;  and  on  the  ground  of  probable  influence 
upon  affairs  the  case  of  the  latter  does  not  on  the  whole  suffer 
by  comparison  with  any  political  theorists  whatsoever.  More- 
over, the  plea  that  neither  the  letter  nor  the  spirit  of  these 
technologies  in  any  great  degree  molded  the  actual  political 
practices  of  the  time  would,  by  parity  of  reasoning,  exclude 
every  great  human  document  from  rank  among  the  formative 
forces  of  the  period  that  produced  it.  This  arbitrary  measure 
of  meaning  factors  in  history  would  leave  among  admitted 
social  forces  not  a  single  standardizing  formutaTion  of  human 
conduct,  from  the  New  Testament  to  Magna  Charta  and  the 
last  three  amendments  to  the  American  Constitution. 

At  all  events  the  cameralists  of  the  books  did  their  share 
toward  systematizing  the  polity  which  was  most  intensively 
developed  by  the  Germans.  Their  works  contain  in  embryo 
everything  which  has  made  the  German  system  today  the  most 
effective  economizer  of  national  energy  in  the  world.    If  a 


xvi  THK  CAMERAMSTS 

tree  should  be  known  hy  its  fruits,  scholars  in  ;j;tn(.ral,  and 
the  Germans  in  particular,  have  Krf>ssly  hlundcrcd  in  sHj^hling 
the  sturdy  slock  from  which  the  mif^hty  growth  of  German 
civic  theory  and  practice  has  dcvelo])ed. 

There  is  a  contrast  between  Roscher's  method  of  ai)proa<  h- 
ing  the  material  and  my  own  in  another  resi)cct.  Roschcr 
attempts  in  general  to  exhibit  the  cameralists  in  national  groups, 
in  connection  with  the  administrative  ))olicies  of  their  respective 
princes.  That  he  is  unable  strictly  to  carry  out  this  plan  is 
evident  from  the  titles  of  his  chapters,  from  the  twelfth  to  the 
twentieth  inclusive,  viz.:  "The  Dutch  School  and  the  Mercan- 
tile System;"  "The  Conservative  National  Economics  of  the 
Middle  of  the  Seventeenth  Century;"  "The  National  Econom- 
ics of  the  Last  (ireat  German  Polyhistorian;"  "The  Austrian 
National  Fxonomics  under  Leopold  I;"  "The  Prussian 
National  Economics  under  the  Great  Elector;"  "Leilmiz 
and  the  Beginnings  of  the  Halle  School;"  "The  National 
Economics  of  Friedrich  Wilhclm  I;"  "The  National  Econom- 
ics of  Frederick  the  Great;"  "The  Older  Eclectics  of  the 
Eighteenth  Century." 

My  plan,  on  the  contrary,  ignored  the  merely  national 
relations  of  the  respective  authors,  and  treated  them  as  nearly 
as  possible  chronologically,  and  as  phenomena  of  a  coherent 
tendency  of  thought.  It  can  hardly  be  claimed  that  the  last 
word  has  been  said  by  or  for  either  of  these  methods.  I  would 
simply  point  out  that  each  has  its  advantages,  and  that  the 
emi)loyment  of  both,  at  their  highest  efficiency,  and  in  co-opera- 
tion with  each  other,  will  doubtless  be  involved  in  the  pro- 
gramme of  future  historians  of  this  period. 

There  is  nowhere  between  the  lines  of  this  book  a  wish 
to  glorify  German  bureaucracy  at  the  expense  of  American 
republicanism.  The  advantage  to  Americans  of  understand- 
ing German  institutions  will  not  come  from  adopting  or  even 
inritating  them,  but  from  adapting  whatever  may  be  learned 


PREFACE  xvu 

from  their  workings  to  the  improvement  of  our  own  institutions. 
The  aim  of  this  book  is  accordingly  to  find  a  point  of  departure 
for  interpretation  of  German  social  theories  and  practice^ 
through  their  own  process  of  evolution.  The  Hegclian.s  would 
say  it  is  a  typical  manifestation  of  the  nature  of  things  that  the 
German  and  American  polities  should  tend  to  complete  each 
other.  The  one  starts  with  the  assumption  of  the  state  as  the 
social  unit.  The  other  starts  with  the  assumj)tion  of  the  indi- 
vidual as  the  social  unit.  Experience  has  shown  that  neither 
assumption  is  the  whole  truth,  that  each  assumption  is  f)art 
of  the  truth,  and  that  the  social  i)roblem  rests  hard  upon  the 
need  of  a  reconstruction  which  shall  organize  these  two  phases 
of  the  truth  into  a  convincing  basis  for  present  social  action. 
I  venture  again  to  express  my  belief  that  a  service  may  be  ren- 
dered to  the  American  side  of  this  assimilation  by  promoting 
acquaintance  with  the  spirit  of  German  polity.  Taking  it 
for  granted  that  the  best  way  to  understand  the  Gcrnian  type 
of  society  and  of  social  theory  is  through  their  evolution,  I 
have  undertaken  to  show  that  the  trunk  line  of  this  evolution 
from  the  Reformation  to  the  French  Revolution  is  marked 
by  the  cameralists. 

This  book  is  not  a  contribution  to  the  social  sciences  in 
the  sense,  that  it  draws  upon  previously  unknown  sources. 
The  cameralists  have  been  catalogued  over  and  over  again.' 
Additional  sources  will  doubtless  be  assembled  when  German 
scholars  interest  themselves  in  recovering  this  portion  of  their 
history.  My  effort  has  been  rather  to  determine  a  new  stand- 
point for  explaining  the  sources.  Nor  is  an  attemjA  to  put 
the  cameralists  in  their  proper  historical  perspective  new  in 
itself.     Not  to  speak  of  interpretations  attempted  while  the 

'  Exhaustive  study  of  the  literature  of  cameralism  should  take,  as 
its  base  of  operations,  Baumstark,  Cameralistische  Encyklopddie,  1835. 
The  state  of  tradition  about  the  meaning  of  the  cameralists  is  ocular 
proof,  however,  that  it  is  a  far  cry  from  bibliography  to  interpretation. 


xviil  THE  CAMERALISTS 

cameralistic  series  in  the  strict  sense  was  still  incomplete,  we 
may  date  the  beginnings  of  historical  treatment  of  cameralism 
from  Rossig.^  Almost  without  exception  these  reviews  of 
cameralism  have  been  so  indiscriminate  that  the  meaning  of 
the  movement  has  been  obscured,  if  not  positively  misrepre- 
sented. Thus,  to  take  the  most  important  instance,  Roscher, 
in  consequence  of  begging  the  methodological  question  at  the 
outset,  makes  a  hodgepodge  of  identities  by  jumbling  together 
survivals  of  mediaeval  legalism  like  Besold,  political  scientists 
of  the  obsolescent  not  the  evolving  type  like  Bornitz,  political 
philosophers  of  massive  mold  like  Pufendorf,  historical  phi- 
losophers like  Moser,  metaphysical  philosophers  like  Leibniz, 
Wolff,  and  Kant,  and  incidentally  the  cameralists.  Not  by 
a  valid  process  of  analysis,  but  by  sheer  force,  Roscher  reduces 
these  unlike  quantities  to  the  common  denominator  "econo- 
mist." In  the  same  way,  and  perhaps  even  more  fallaciously, 
Bluntschli  had  joined  together  heterogeneous  elements  as  a 
continuous  series  in  political  science.  I  do  not  deny  that  every 
type  of  theory  reacts  upon  every  other  type;  but  it  is  juvenile 
to  assume  that  in  any  age  the  influence  of  a  metaphysician  and 
of  a  historian,  for  example,  upon  each  other's  peculiar  type  of 
thinking,  is  as  direct  and  intense  as  that  of  two  metaphysicians 
or  two  historians.  Sometimes  such  cross-fertilization  is  more 
fruitful  than  in-and-in  breeding.  Again  it  is  not.  Neither  is 
it  to  be  assumed  in  a  given  case  without  proof.  Nor  can  it  be 
taken  for  granted  that  propositions  occurring  casually  in  one 
theory,  but  belonging  primarily  to  another,  may  be  carried 
over  at  face  value  into  the  theory  to  which  they  secondarily 
belong.  For  instance,  a  theologian  might  cull  from  every 
economic  author  of  the  last  fifty  years  passages  which  carry 
some  sort  of  theological  implications.  Those  implications 
might  or  might  not  have  been  apparent  to  the  authors  them- 

•  Versuch  einer  Geschichte  der  Oekonomie  und  Canter alwissenschajt, 

2  vols.,   1 78 1. 


PRKFACF  XIX 

selves  and  intended  by  them.  In  any  event  it  would  be  absurd 
to  make  a  history  of  theology  for  the  last  fifty  years  by  jjatching 
together  such  passages  with  others  which  were  immediately 
theological  in  their  premises  and  purpose.  Before  a  truthful 
expression  of  one  type  of  theory  can  be  made  in  terms  of  another 
the  mental  latitude  and  longitude  of  each  gn)up  of  theorists, 
and  even  of  each  individual  theorist,  must  be  accurately  deter- 
mined, and  corrections  must  be  made  accordingly  in  the  ])rc- 
sumptive  force  of  their  formulas.  Neither  Bluntschli  nor 
Roscher  })roperly  recognized  this  principle.  It  is  a  marvel 
therefore  that  German  scholarship  has  permitted  the  books  of 
these  authors  so  long  to  hold  their  place  as  standard  accounts 
of  the  process  of  evolution  in  the  German  social  sciences.  The 
following  pages  are  devoted  to  determining  the  grouj)  equation 
of  the  cameralists  only. 

Meanwhile  the  little  book  of  Marchet'  deserves  much  more 
attention  than  it  seems  to  have  received,  either  in  FAiro])e  or 
in  this  country.  Indeed,  I  could  not  have  expressed  myself 
as  above  about  the  persistent  authority  of  Roscher  if  I  could 
trace  in  recent  German  literature  any  considerable  tendency 
to  countenance  Marchet's  secession.  The  chief  reason  for 
the  neglect  will  doubtless  be  found  in  the  tacit  assumption  that, 
since  Bluntschli  and  Roscher,  German  social  theory  previous 
to  the  nineteenth  century  is  to  De  considered  as  a  closed  incident. 
I  must  acknowledge  that  Marchet  has  very  largely  anticipated 
my  conclusions,  particularly  upon  the  fabulous  character  of 
tradition  with  respect  to  German  mercantilism  as  a  theory, 
and  as  to  the  doctrine  of  population.  Any  competent  scholar 
was  bound  to  reach  similar  results  if  he  analyzed  the  sources 
instead  of  repeating  hearsay. 

»  Sludien  iiber  die  Entwickelung  der  Verwaliungslehre  in  Deutschland 
von  der  vweiten  Haljte  des  17.  bis  zum  Ende  des  18.  Jahrhunderts.  Von 
Dr.  Gustav  Marchet,  o.  o.  Professor  an  der  k.-k.  Hochschule  fUr  Boden- 
cultur  in  Wien.      Miinchen,  1885  (pp.  viii  4-437). 


XX  THE  CAMICRALISTS 

Until  1  had  reached  my  own  conclusions  from  examination 
of  the  original  writers,  1  deliberately  ignored  the  commentators 
as  far  as  possible.  Marchet  was  accordingly  merely  a  name 
to  me  until  I  had  completed  my  manuscript.  This  was  for- 
tunate, because  if  I  had  been  familiar  with  his  work  I  could  not 
have  been  sure  of  the  independence  of  my  own  judgment.  Tn 
matters  of  detail  Marchet  notes  i)articulars  which  I  had  omitted, 
others  which  I  had  not  discovered,  about  SeckendorfT,  Becher, 
Hornick,  Schroder,  and  Justi.  His  estimate  of  Hornick  is 
esj)ecially  notable,  as  he  had  the  advantage  of  access  to  his 
book  and  other  evidence  which  I  could  not  obtain.  On  the 
other  hand,  comparison  of  my  own  methofl,  and  its  resulting 
interpretation,  with  Marchet's  tends  to  confirm  my  belief  that 
I  am  on  the  right  track.  In  the  first  place,  the  extent  to  which 
Marchet  relies  on  the  generalization  eudaemonism  to  explain 
the  |)()litical  philoso[)hy  of  the  time  too  closely  resembles  the 
method  of  Kautz.  In  the  second  f)lace,  Marchet  is  not  suffi- 
ciently free  from  the  [)rime  fallacy  of  Roscher.  He  does  not 
jKjrceive  that  he  has  to  deal  with  several  distinct  ty]>es  of  theo- 
rists. These  must  be  analyzed  in  turn,  with  reference  to  their 
resf)ective  centers  of  attention,  before  a  valid  synthesis  of  their 
unlike  doctrines  is  pos.sible.  That  is,  the  same  sort  of  analysis 
to  which  this  volume  subjects  the  cameralists  must  be  performed 
upon  several  distinct  groups  of  thinkers,  e.  g.,  the  general  phi- 
losophers, the  political  i)hilosophers,  the  moral  i)hilosophers, 
etc.  Since  this  particular  analysis  has  not  been  apf)lied  rigor- 
ously by  Marchet  to  the  cameralists  as  such,  or  to  either  of 
the  «>ther  groups  in'  juded  in  his  survey,  his  book,  with  all  its 
merits,  leaves  these  theorists  still  not  properly  differentiated, 
and  not  inteq)reted  strictly  by  the  functional  meaning  of  each, 
in  the  whole  process  of  developing  a  system  of  social  doctrines. 

Schmoller  has  re.scued  the  method  of  Roscher  from  futility 
by  projecting  the  large  survey  within  which  all  details  of  civic 
development,  [)articularly  in  (icrmany,  must  be  located.     In 


PREFACE  XXI 

his  more  intensive  historical  work  Schmoller  has  dealt  imme- 
diately with  industrial  and  administrative  development  more 
than  with  the  growth  of  theories.  Analysis  of  the  cameralists 
therefore  explains  one  of  the  systems  of  communication,  so 
to  speak,  that  penetrated  the  territory  in  which  SchmoUer's 
primacy  among  explorers  is  secure.  His  monograph,  Mer- 
cantilism,  is  the  best  introduction  that  can  be  recommended 
for  the  present  volume.  The  relation  of  his  more  extended 
and  technical  treatment  of  the  subject  to  the  present  study  is 
indicated  in  the  first  chapter  of  this  book. 

In  the  following  pages  I  have  tried  to  present  a  digest  of 
everything  in  the  writings  of  the  leading  cameralists  which  is 
necessary  to  an  impartial  conclusion  about  their  meaning  for 
the  German  social  sciences.  Accordingly  I  offer  in  this  volume 
a  source  book  containing  the  most  pertinent  evidence  about  the 
real  significance  of  the  cameralists.  These  sources  put  each 
reader  in  possession  of  the  means  of  testing  my  conclusions,  and 
of  estimating  the  cameralists  for  himself.  The  only  precon- 
ception which  I  carried  to  the  study  of  these  theorists  was  the 
historical  commonplace  that  they  must  be  allowed  to  speak 
for  themselves,  and  from  their  own  standpoint,  whatever  that 
might  prove  to  be.  This  commonplace  has  had  at  best  fitful 
respect  among  social  theorists  or  historians  of  social  theory. 

My  chief  interest  in  the  cameralists  is  least  of  all  antiquarian. 
I  want  to  know  what  can  be  learned  from  them  that  is  of  per- 
manent use  for  sociological  methodology.  My  suspicions  were 
early  aroused  that  the  fate  which  had  befallen  them  would 
turn  out  to  enforce  certain  primary  methodological  laws  in 
application  to  the  social  sciences;  and  first  of  all  the  law  that 
every  historical  actor  must  be  judged  primarily  with  reference 
to  his  immediate  purposes,  not  as  though  his  purposes  were 
those  of  the  moment  at  which  the  judgment  was  passed.  I 
suspected  that  some  of  the  non  sequiturs  \\  liich  are  epidemic 
in  the  social  sciences  would  be  found  undisguised  in  a  com- 


xxii  THE  CAMERALISTS 

parison  of  the  cameralists  as  they  really  were  with  the  traditior. 
of  them  in  the  histories.  It  seemed  to  me  that,  if  this  turned 
out  to  be  the  case,  exposure  of  the  bad  logic,  in  an  example  so 
far  in  the  past  that  it  enlists  no  partisan  prejudice,  would  do 
more  to  promote  valid  reasoning  upon  current  questions  in 
the  social  sciences  than  possible  direct  refutations  of  contem- 
porary argument.  I  therefore  undertook  a  laborious  historical 
search,  not  chiefly  from  historical  interest,  but  for  specifically 
methodological  purposes.  If  historical  valuations  of  the 
cameralists  had  mistreated  them,  I  wanted  to  ferret  out  the 
precise  flaw  in  the  process,  as  a  concrete  warning  against  paral- 
lel miscarriages  of  judgment  at  present. 

All  that  I  knew  about  the  cameralists,  when  I  began  this 
study,  I  had  learned  from  Roscher.  On  the  general  grounds 
indicated  above,  I  decided  that  if  Roscher's  composite  picture 
of  so  many  different  types  did  justice  to  each,  and  to  the  syn- 
thesis of  them,  it  would  be  an  amazing  coincidence;  and  I 
determined  to  find  out  for  myself  whether  such  a  phenomenon 
had  occurred.  I  first  studied  Justi,  and  at  once  made  out 
indications  which  had  not  appeared  in  Roscher's  report.  It  was 
evident  moreover  that  there  were  more  intimate  relations  than 
a  mere  chronological  before-and-after  between  Justi  and  other 
writers.  Following  this  clue,  I  abstracted  from  Roscher's 
heterogeneous  collection  of  men  who  had  more  or  less  directly 
affected  economic  ideas  a  group  with  like  marks  of  species. 
German  civic  theory  in  general  so  evidently  proceeds  from  or 
at  least  through  this  type  of  thinkers  that  the  finding  marks 
forthwith  furnish  the  fixed  points  from  which  to  interpret 
the  whole  evolution  of  German  social  science.  Whether  the 
record  proves  to  contain  exhibits  of  methodological  principles, 
either  in  the  breach  or  in  the  observance,  is  discussed  in  the 
concluding  chapter. 

I  have  intentionally  disobeyed  the  rules  of  good  writing 
by  retaining  in  the  text  many  German  words,  instead  of  trying 


PREFACE  xxiii 

to  propose  English  equivalents.  This  was  for  two  chief  rea- 
sons: first,  that  translation  unavoidably  interprets,  and  in 
the  present  connection  it  almost  certainly  interprets  anachro- 
nistically.  Any  terms  by  which  we  might  translate  leading 
concepts  of  the  cameralists,  unless  they  might  be  careful  cir- 
cumlocutions, would  impute  to  them  shades  of  meaning  which 
would  really  be  ours,  not  theirs.  In  another  class  of  cases  I 
have  gone  still  farther  in  retaining  German  terms  or  even  con- 
siderable quotations,  when  I  judged  that  the  matter  in  hand 
would  have  value  only  for  readers  somewhat  familiar  with 
German.  This  was  both  for  the  sake  of  precision  and  to  retain 
local  color. 

With  the  same  purpose  in  view  I  have  deliberately  chosen 
awkward  renderings  of  many  German  expressions.  By  so 
doing  I  have  most  accurately  indicated  the  ideas  of  the  various 
authors.  In  many  ways  their  thought  was  not  as  our  thought, 
and  it  is  a  falsification  of  history  to  make  them  speak  as  men 
would  now.  American  conceptions  of  the  growth  and  mean- 
ing of  German  social  theory  have  been  confused  by  neglect 
of  translators  to  count  with  this  elemental  fact.  This  has 
been  amply  emphasized  in  the  body  of  the  book,  but  I  add  a 
typical  instance  from  a  different  source. ,  While  writing  this 
preface  I  had  occasion,  in  another  connection,  to  consult  the 
English  version  of  Heeren's  Geschichte  des  europdischen  Staa- 
tensy sterns.^  Of  European  states  from  the  beginning  of  the 
sixteenth  century,  Heeren  is  made  to  say: 

At  first,  therefore,  the  royal  authority  in  these  kingdoms  was 
everywhere  much  limited.  Without  the  aid  of  the  nobility  no 
important  war  could  be  carried  on;  without  the  consent  of  the 
cities  no  taxes  could  be  levied.     Without  standing  armies  (a  small 

*  Originally  published  1808-9.  I  r&lcr  to  the  fifth  edition  (1830), 
Vol.  IX  of  the  Historische  Werke,  p.  16.  The  English  translation  appeared 
in  1864  under  the  title,  A  Manual  0}  the  History  oj  the  Political  System 
oj  Europe  and  Its  Colonies.    The  passage  is  on  p.  11. 


xxiv  THE  CAMP:RALISTS 

beginning  excepted),  without  political  economy'  (for  no  art  was 
known  but  that  of  getting  money),  there  existed,  in  reality,  ai  this 
time  no  power,  in  the  present  acceptation  of  the  word. 

In  the  first  place,  Heeren's  own  proposition  about  Sta^is- 
U'irthscha/t  was  a  generality  which  would  not  l)ear  rigorous 
criticism.  In  the  second  place,  whether  the  author  had  a 
correct  idea  in  mind  or  not,  the  term  Staatswirthscliaft  itself 
has  to  he  credited  with  a  different  content  for  every  period  of 
which  it  is  positively  or  negatively  predicated.  It  did  not  even 
have  the  identical  connotations  when  Heeren's  last  edition  was 
published  which  it  had  carried  when  the  book  first  appeared; 
and  never  and  nowhere  had  it  meant  precisely  what  writers 
or  readers  in  England  in  1864  understood  by  the  phrase  "polit- 
ical economy."  Still  further,  as  the  following  clause  stands 
in  the  quotation  it  furnishes  a  second  illustration  of  the  need  of 
par?.[)hrasc  fairly  to  represent  the  original.  The  author's 
real  meaning  would  be  conveyed  by  the  substitute:  "the 
financial  administration  of  states  did  not  go  beyond  pro- 
grammes for  raising  revenues."  Standing  by  themselves, 
these  particular  instances  are  not  of  firstrate  importance.  They 
are  merely  samples  of  thousands  scattered  through  English 
literature  of  the  social  sciences.  The  aggregate  effect  of  unhis- 
torical  renderings  of  German  terms,  added  to  the  unsatisfac- 
tory condition  of  the  German  tradition  itself,  is  a  state  of  regret- 
table misinformation  among  English  readers  about  the  actual 
course  of  development  in  German  social  theor>'  and  practice. 
I  have  tried,  therefore,  to  report  the  camcralisls  in  language 
that  reflects  the  partial  analysis  actually  in  their  minds,  and 
which  does  not  represent  them  as  using  nineteenth-  and  twen- 
tieth-century concepts  of  Germans,  still  less  of  Englishmen 
or  Americans. 

'  The  italics  are  mine,  and  the  author'.s  word  is  Slaatswirlhschajl. 
The  next  clause  in  parenthesis  reads:  man  kannle  nur  die  Kunsl,  (Jeld 
aujtuhringen. 


PREFACE  xxv 

It  has  been  my  intention  also  to  retain  all  archaisms  and 
other  peculiarities,  even  to  obvious  typographical  errors,  in 
quotations,  titles,  etc.,  in  order  to  represent  the  exact  state  of 
the  texts  used.  My  notes,  however,  were  reorganized  several 
times,  and  were  recopied  by  several  hands.  Moreover,  space 
limits  compelled  me  to  omit  an  appendix  which  would  have 
occupied  150  pages.  It  was  to  contain  the  tables  of  contents 
of  the  principal  books  cited,  and  other  illustrative  material. 
The  retrenchment  compelled  frequent  alterations  in  the  body  of 
the  book.  At  the  time  of  revising  the  proof  most  of  the  volumes 
used  had  necessarily  been  returned  to  libraries  in  this  country 
and  Germany.  I  have  not  been  unmindful  of  the  duty  of 
verification,  but  it  was  thus  not  strictly  within  my  power.  I 
fear  therefore  that,  although  I  have  fortified  myself  as  well  as 
circumstances  would  permit  against  material  errors,  in  matters 
of  form  the  citations  contain  inaccuracies  which  might  have 
been  removed  if  the  sources  had  been  longer  at  my  disposal. 
The  capitalization,  spelling,  punctuation,  etc.,  must  accordingly 
be  taken  as  illustrating  rather  than  precisely  transcribing  the 
passages  cited. 

My  most  grateful  thanks  are  due  to  the  K'dnigUche  Biblio- 
thek  at  Berlin  for  the  loan  of  a  large  number  of  the  cameralistic 
works  without  which  this  book  could  not  have  been  written. 
My  obligations  are  equally  real  for  similar  assistance  from  the 
libraries  of  Harvard,  Columbia,  and  Cornell  and  for  important 
information  from  the  British  Museum. 

Albion   W.    Small 

January  i,   igog 


CHAPTER  I 
INTRODUCTION  TO  CAMERALISM 

Every  theory,  system,  science  is  in  some  way  a  reflection 
of  the  prevailing  purposes  of  the  time  in  which  it  developed. 

No  hypothesis  about  the  precise  nature  of  the  cause  and 
effect  concerned  is  concealed  in  this  commonplace.  We  need 
not  raise  that  question.  Enough  that  in  some  way  or  other, 
which  it  is  not  necessary  to  discuss  at  this  point,  our  philosophies 
echo  the  dominant  purposes  of  the  time  that  produced  them. 

If  we  attempt  to  detach  a  system  of  thought  from  the  whole 
scheme  of  activities  impelled  by  the  prevailing  systems  of  pur- 
poses, and  if  we  try  to  set  forth  the  meaning  of  that  thought  as 
though  it  had  no  connection  with  those  purposes,  the  result  is 
inevitable  misinterpretation. 

The  same  effect  follows  unintentional  not  less  than  delib- 
erate separation  of  a  body  of  thought,  in  which  we  are  especially 
interested,  from  the  surrounding  circumstances  of  its  develop- 
ment. It  is  like  abstracting  a  plant  from  the  soil  and  atmos- 
phere which  are  the  media  of  its  existence,  and  then  expecting 
it  both  to  grow  and  to  reveal  the  abstract  process  of  its  previous 
growth. 

Speaking  particularly  of  the  social  sciences,  tlieir  crudeness 
at  present  is  in  part  the  result  of  arbitrary  dismemberment  of 
the  process  of  which  science  is  an  interpretation,  and  consequent 
substitution  of  fictitious  processes,  more  or  less  remote  from  on? 
another  and  meaningless  for  one  another.  We  have  then, 
so  far  as  we  depend  upon  these  sciences  for  knowledge,  a  col- 
lection of  ghosts  stalking  abroad  in  defiance  of  all  known  laws, 
and  apparently  tending  less  and  less  to  explain  reality. 

A  single  instance  in  which  this  has  occurred  on  a  rather 
large  scale  furnishes  the  j)rimary  motive  of  this  book     We  are 


2  THE  CAMERALISTS 

to  deal  with  cameralists  and  cameralism.  A  history  of  neither 
is  to  be  allemi)ted.  At  most  this  hook  may  he  called  a  brief 
of  the  argument  which  a  history  would  have  to  complete  if  it 
were  to  satisfy  sociologists. 

An  authentic  interpretation  of  cameralism  necessarily 
gives  the  most  prominent  place,  in  the  center  of  the  picture, 
to  Justi.  In  order  however  rightly  to  estimate  Justi,  the  work 
of  other  cameralists  before  and  after  his  time  must  be  analyzed 
and  compared  with  his  system.  For  the  purposes  of  this  survey 
then  we  shall  regard  cameralism  as  beginning  with  Seckendorff ,' 
and  ending  with  Sonnenfels.*  A  history  of  cameralism  would 
have  to  begin  more  than  a  century  before  these  pioneers.  It 
would  trace  beginnings  earlier  than  the  time  of  Elector  August 
of  Saxony  (1553-86)  and  Landgrave  Philipp  of  Hesse  (1518- 
67).  It  would  follow  changes  of  form,  content,  relations,  and 
name,  and  it  would  be  obliged  to  show,  finally,  that  present 
differences  between  German  and  English  institutions  must 
be  stated  partially  in  terms  of  the  persistence  in  the  one  case 
of  a  cameralistic  tradition  which  was  never  naturalized  in  the 
other. 

Le.xis,  in  Conrad's  Handworterbuch,  under  the  title  "  Kame- 
ralwissenschaft,"  states  that  the  emperor  Maximilian  I  estab- 
lished several  Reichskammer,  e.g.,  the  Kammergericht,  1495, 
and  that  in  the  course  of  the  sixteenth  century  the  type  of  admin- 
istration began  to  f)e  developed  in  the  chief  states  of  the  ICmpire. 
If  we  refer  to  this  infancy  of  the  system  and  of  its  technology, 
we  are  obliged  to  set  our  boundaries  back  so  as  to  include  among 
the  writers  Melchior  von  Osse,  whose  Testament  was  written 
in  1555,  and  Georg  Obrecht,  whose  FUnf  unterschiedliche 
Secrela  Politica  appeared  in  Strassburg  in  161 7.  These  authors 
will  presently  be  discussed  at  some  length. 

Readers  who  use  English  only  know  cameralism  chiefly 

■  Teutsche  Fiirstenstaat,  1655. 

'  Grundsdtu  der  Poticey,  Handlung  und  Finant,  1765. 


INTRODUCTION  TO  CAMERALISM  3 

through  the  historians  of  economics.  The  interi^retation  of 
cameralism  in  English  tradition  arbitrarily  wrests  the  thing 
and  its  science  from  the  setting  in  which  it  is  intelligible.  Exag- 
gerating almost  to  paradox,  we  may  say  that  cameralism  was 
not  a  theory  and  practice  of  economics  but  of  politics.  Came- 
ralism was  a  technique  and  a  theory  of  administering  a  peculiar 
type  of  state  in  a  society  constructed  out  of  peculiar  types  of  pur- 
poses. To  be  sure,  economic  conditions  and  purposes  formed 
their  share  of  the  circumstances  to  which  cameralism  was  an 
adaptation.  The  argument  which  will  follow  is  not  an  attempt 
to  turn  the  flank  of  the  economic  interpretation  of  history.  No 
issue  is  raised  with  those  who  insist  that  the  ultimate  elements 
of  all  factors  of  social  situations  are  economic.  Be  that  as  it 
may,  the  actors  in  a  given  social  situation  think  of  the  elements 
with  which  they  are  dealing  as  different  in  kind,  and  they 
construct  their  systems  of  theory  and  practice  accordingly. 
Cameralism  raised,  directly  and  deliberately,  no  fundamental 
questions  of  pure  economics.  It  was  primarily  a  theory  and  a 
technique  of  government.  Solution  of  problems  of  the  nature 
and  laws  of  wealth  is  logically  antecedent  to  governmental 
institutions,  to  be  sure,  but  until  the  last  quarter  of  the  eight- 
eenth century  the  principle  had  been  generally  ignored. 
Governmental  theory  dealt  with  economic  problems  of  course. 
Instead  of  formulating  these  separately  as  economic  problems, 
however,  it  recognized  no  economic  problems  of  the  degree  of 
generality  familiar  since  Adam  Smith's  time.  It  dealt  with 
economic  relations  as  merely  incidental  to  the  application  of 
governmental  principles,  and  the  latter,  as  proclaimed  at  the 
time,  were  in  many  respects  narrowly  provincial. 

The  situation  which  actually  existed  in  Germany  in  the 
seventeenth  and  eighteenth  centuries  was  a  resultant  of  pur- 
poses which  were  conditioned  first  by  these  chief  objective 
factors,  viz.,  the  soil  and  climate  of  the  country;  the  state  of 
the  arts  required  for  using  natural  resources;    the  domestic 


4  THE  CAMERALISTS 

industrial  structure,  and  the  foreign  trade  relations;  the  eccle- 
siastical organization;  the  Holy  Roman  Empire;  the  character 
of  the  states  within  the  Empire,  and  outside  of  it  in  Europe 
including  nearer  Asia;  the  prizes  for  national  competition  in 
the  wealth  of  the  Americas,  the  Levant,  and  the  remote  East; 
and  the  personal  equation  of  the  citizens.  Then,  second, 
there  were  firstrate  subjective  factors,  which  may  be  scheduled 
as  the  contemporary  science,  the  theology  or  philosophy,  the 
legal  tradition  both  from  Roman  and  Teuton  sources,  the 
political  philosophy,  and  the  rule-of-thumb  conclusions  which 
passed  as  wisdom  in  the  conduct  of  life,  from  individual  habit 
to  the  policies  of  states. 

In  this  situation,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  the  idea  of  the  state 
and  of  government  dominated  all  the  other  factors.  So  far 
as  interests  of  the  state  could  be  distinguished,  they  settled  the 
relative  importance  of  everything  else.  The  purposes  of  the 
state  were  paramount.  The  cameralists  were  servants  of  the 
state.  Cameralism  was  the  system  elaborated  by  the  chief 
agents  of  the  rulers,  partly  as  mere  classification  of  practices 
which  rulers  had  already  adopted;  partly  as  ways  and  means 
of  accomplishing  more  of  the  purposes  which  the  state  proposed. 

But  in  order  properly  to  prepare  for  intelligent  interpreta- 
tion of  cameralism  still  simpler  elements  of  the  situation  must 
be  called  to  mind. 

In  the  first  place,  we  must  remember  that  the  German  ter- 
ritorial sovereignties  in  the  period  of  the  Reformation  were 
essentially  more  like  a  typical  Virginia  plantation,  in  the  most 
flourishing  days  of  the  Old  Dominion,  than  like  any  political 
unit  with  which  modem  Americans  are  familiar.  Even  if  the 
prince  controlled  territories  which  it  would  not  be  extravagant 
to  describe  as  big  farms,  it  was  long  before  the  operations  of 
management  were  transformed  from  the  primitive  type  of  the 
big  landed  estate  to  a  definitive  civic  structure.  The  adminis- 
tration of  German  states  developed  by  a  process  which  it  does 


INTRODUCTION  TO  CAMERALISM  5 

not  fall  within  the  scope  of  this  book  to  trace,  from  the  slatus 
in  which  the  consort  of  the  prince  presided  in  person  over  the 
revenues  of  the  principality,  almost  as  directly  as  the  New 
England  farmer's  wife  managed  her  dairy.  The  advisers  and 
chief  functionaries,  who  gradually  acquired  the  meaning  which 
we  find  them  possessing  in  the  cameralistic  period,  were  ge- 
netically differentiations  of  this  proprietary  relation  and  policy. 
The  lord  of  the  estate  was  to  their  minds,  whatever  their  par- 
ticular philosophy,  a  fixed  term  in  the  equation  of  life.  They 
were  powerless  to  think  of  a  social  order  as  rational  which  did 
not  revolve  about  him  as  a  regulator. 

The  great  majority  of  the  people  in  the  German  states, 
the  peasants  and  artisans  particularly,  were  regarded  by  the 
wisest  men  of  the  time  as  incapable  of  successful  initiative. 
As  an  estimate  of  actual  conditions  the  judgment  was  undoubt- 
edly correct.  The  people  were  accordingly  held  to  be  dedicated 
by  dispensation  of  Providence  and  the  laws  of  nature  to  the 
condition  of  wardship,  and  to  be  fit  for  action  only  under 
authority.  The  fallacy  of  this  generalization  need  not  concern 
us.  It  is  a  historical  fact  and  force.  The  ruler  and  his  gov- 
ernment were  quite  consistently  seen  in  the  most  plausible  light 
when  they  were  contemplated  as  fulfilling  the  duties  of  guardian- 
ship over  these  industrially  and  politically  incompetent  masses. 
Under  the  circumstances  paternalism  was  not  an  arrest  of 
development;  still  less  in  principle  an  abuse  of  power. 
Whether  in  operation  or  in  theory,  it  was  the  ideal  expression 
of  the  situation. 

Again,  from  the  beginning,  the  German  states  were  involved 
in  a  struggle  for  existence.  With  the  kind  of  necessity  here 
concerned  we  have  now  nothing  to  do,  beyond  recognizing 
it  as  a  factor  taken  for  granted  by  the  statesmen  of  the  period. 
In  fact  the  most  importunate  problem  for  every  German  state 
was,  in  its  own  calculation,  that  of  self-maintenance,  and 
especially  by  control  of  an  adequate  military  force. 


6  THE  CAMERALISTS 

The  camcralists  of  the  books,  as  distinguished  from  the 
cameralists  of  the  bureaus,  although  the  former  class  was 
usually  recruited  from  the  latter,  were  the  men  who  worked 
out  for  publication,  and  especially  for  pedagogical  purposes, 
the  system  of  procedure  in  accordance  with  which  German 
governments  were  supposed  to  perform  their  tasks.  As  a 
rule  these  men  were  employed  in  administrative  positions  of 
some  sort,  and  spoke  to  a  certain  extent  from  experience.  They 
were  not  mere  academic  theorists.  We  may  characterize  these 
cameralists  of  the  books  as  the  group  of  Tjuriters  distinguished 
from  tfieir  contemporaries  and  from  earlier  and  later  theorists 
by  constructing  a  '^^ science"  or  group  of  ^^ sciences"  around  the 
central  consideration  of  the  fiscal  needs  of  the  prince.  We  might 
coin  the  name  "fiscalists"  and  it  would  be  more  appropriate 
to  their  actual  character  than  either  of  the  terms  by  which 
they  have  been  known.  Under  the  circumstances  to  which 
we  have  referred,  the  most  constant  and  pressing  need  of  the 
ruler  was  ready  money.  The  men  who  elaborated  the  theory 
of  government  for  these  German  states  had  virtually  to 
answer  this  question:  What  programme  must  a  wise  govern- 
ment adopt,  in  order  first  and  foremost  to  be  adequately  supplied 
with  ready  money,  and  thus  able  to  discJtarge  the  duties  of  the 
state  in  their  various  orders  of  importance  ?  The  most  typical 
of  these  men  expressed  this  paramount  consideration  very 
positively  and  frankly.  One  of  the  reasons  why  later  cameral- 
ists used  superficially  different  formulations  of  the  same  essen- 
tial regime,  was  that  the  fiscal  systems  had  become  relatively 
fixed,  and  could  be  taken  for  granted.  The  less  convention- 
alized portions  of  the  system,  and  especially  the  idealized 
versions  of  its  aims,  could  then  come  in  for  a  larger  share  of 
attention ;  and  there  was  more  room  for  speculative  excursions 
into  the  wider  political  philosophy  or  the  deeper  metaphysics 
by  which  later  writers  hoped  to  buttress  the  system. 

In  the  rough,  the  chronic  condition  of  the  European  nations 


INTRODUCTION  TO  CAMERALISM  7 

during  the  cameralistic  period  was  war,  and  the  primary  task 
of  governments,  especially  in  Germany,  was  creation  of  readi- 
ness for  war.  The  fiscal  policy  which  was  the  rule  in  Europe 
during  the  period  is  known  as  the  mercantile  system.^  This 
policy,  as  a  cardinal  political  fact,  is  a  datum  presupposed 
by  the  present  study.    As  Schmoller  says  (p.  57) : 

If  we  pause  for  a  while  to  consider  this  foreign  and  external 
policy  of  the  European  states  of  the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth 
centuries — which  it  has  hitherto  been  the  custom  to  regard  as  the 
essential  feature  of  the  mercantile  system — it  is  not,  of  course,  our 
purpose  to  describe  the  details  of  its  several  forms.  The  general 
features  of  its  regulation  are  well  enough  known.  Difficulties  were 
put  in  the  way  of  the  importation  of  manufactured  goods;  and  their 
production  and  exportation  were  favored  by  the  prohibition  of  the 
export  of  raw  materials,  by  bounties  on  export,  and  by  commercial 
treaties.  Encouragement  was  given  to  domestic  shipping,  to  the 
fisheries,  and  to  the  coasting  trade  by  restricting  or  forbidding  foreign 
competition.  Commerce  with  the  colonies,  and  the  supplying  of 
them  with  European  wares,  was  reserved  for  the  mother  country. 
The  importation  of  colonial  produce  had  to  take  place  directly  from 
the  colony  itself,  and  not  by  way  of  other  European  ports;  and 
everywhere  an  attempt  was  made  to  establish  direct  trading  relations 
by  great  privileged  trading  companies,  and  by  state  aid  in  manifold 

ways The  general  features  are  known;    the  details  have 

even  yet  not  been  subjected  to  due  scientific  investigation.  Our 
only  purpose  here  is  to  grasp  the  fundamental  ideas  of  the  system; 
which,  naturaify,  found  varying  expressions,  here  in  high  duties, 
there  in  low,  here  in  the  prevention,  there  in  the  encouragement  of 
the  com  trade.  The  thought  pursued  everywhere  was  this:  as 
competition  with  other  countries  fluctuated  up  and  down,  to  cast 
the  weight  of  the  power  of  the  state  into  the  scales  of  the  balance  in 
the  way  demanded  in  each  case  by  national  interests. 

»  Vide  Schmoller,  The  Mercantile  System  and  Its  Historical  Sig- 
nificance (Macmillan,  1902).  Translated  from  the  Studien  uber  die 
wirthschajtliche  Politik  Friedrichs  des  Grossen  (1883),  published  in  the 
first  issue  of  Schmoller's  Jahrbuch  (1884). 


8  THE  CAMERALISTS 

We  have  accepted  Schmoller's  general  hypothesis  in  expla- 
nation of  the  mercantihst  system.  His  view  must  be  taken 
as  representing,  in  its  main  features,  the  consensus  of  present 
historical  scholarship.    He  epitomizes  it  in  this  form:' 

Our  purpose  was  to  show  by  a  particular  example,  that  of  Bran- 
denburg, that  during  the  course  of  the  period  from  the  fifteenth  to 
the  seventeenth  century,  the  creation  of  the  German  territorial  state 

was  not  merely  a  political  but  also  an  economic  necessity We 

have  to  do  with  a  great  historical  process  by  which  local  sentiment 
and  tradition  were  strengthened,  the  social  and  economic  forces  of 
the  whole  territory  consolidated,  important  legal  and  economic 
institutions  created;  by  which,  further,  the  forces  and  institutions 
thus  united  were  led  to  a  battle  of  competition  with  other  territories, 
involving  numerous  shiftings  of  toll,  confiscation  of  goods  and  ships, 
embargoes  and  staple-fights,  prohibitions  of  importation  and  expor- 
tation and  the  like;  while,  within  the  country  itself,  old  antagonisms 
softened  and  trade  became  more  free. 

To  so  powerful  and  self-contained  a  structure  and  so  independent 
and  individual  a  policy  as  the  town  had  reached  in  an  earlier  age^ 
the  German  territory  scarcely  anywhere  attained  ....  yet  this 
very  time — the  second  half  of  the  sixteenth  century,  and  the  seven- 
teenth century — was  an  ejxjch  which  gave  every  inducement  for  an 
economic  transformation.  The  way  was  already  clear,  out  of  the 
narrow  circle  of  the  small  territory  into  the  larger  union  of  forces 

|X)ssible  only  in  the  great  state These  forces  all  converging 

impelled  society  to  some  large  economic  reorganization  on  a  broader 
basis,  and  pointed  to  the  creation  of  national  states  with  a  correspond- 
ing policy Everywhere,  save  in  Germany,  economic  bodies 

were  stretching  out  and  becoming  political;  everywhere  new  state 
systems  of  economy  and  finance  were  arising,  able  to  meet  the  new 
needs  of  the  time.  Only  in  our  Fatherland  did  the  old  economic 
institutions  become  so  petrified  as  to  lose  all  life;  only  in  Germany 
were  the  foreign  trade,  the  manufacturing  skill,  the  supply  of  capital, 
the  good  economic  usages,  connections  and  traditions,  which  the 
country  had  possessed  up  to  1620,  more  and  more  completely  lost. 

»  Loc.  cit.,  pp.  43  ff. 


INTRODUCTION  TO  CAMERALISM  9 

And  it  was  not  simply  the  external  loss  in  men  and  capital  whic  li 
brought  about  this  retrogression  of  Germany,  during  a  period  of 
more  than  one  century,  in  comparison  with  the  Powers  of  the  West; 
it  was  not  even  the  transference  of  the  world's  trading  routes  from 
the  Mediterranean  to  the  ocean  that  was  of  most  consequence;  it 
was  the  lack  of  politico-economic  organization,  the  lack  of  consolida- 
tion in  its  forces.  What,  to  each  in  its  time,  gave  riches  and  supe- 
riority first  to  Milan,  Venice,  Florence,  and  Genoa;  then  later  to 
Spain  and  Portugal;  and  now  to  Holland,  France,  and  England, 
and,  to  some  extent  to  Denmark  and  Sweden,  was  a  state  policy  in 
economic  matters  as  superior  to  the  territorial  as  that  had  been  to 
the  municipal.  Those  states  began  to  weave  the  great  economic 
improvements  of  the  time  into  their  political  institutions  and  policies, 
and  to  bring  about  an  intimate  relation  between  the  one  and  the 
other.  States  arose,  forming  united,  and  therefore  strong  and  wealthy 
economic  bodies,  quite  different  from  earlier  conditions;  in  these, 
quite  unlike  earlier  times,  the  state  organization  assisted  the  national 
economy  and  this  the  state  policy;  and,  quite  unlike  earlier  times 
too,  public  finance  served  as  the  bond  of  union  between  political 
and  economic  life.  It  was  not  only  a  question  of  state  armies,  fleets, 
and  civil  services,  it  was  a  question  rather  of  unifying  systems  of 
finance  and  economy  which  should  encompass  the  forces  of  millions 
and  whole  countries,  and  give  unity  to  their  social  life.  There  had 
always  been  great  states;  but  they  had  been  bound  together  neither 
by  traffic  nor  by  the  organization  of  labor  nor  by  any  other  like  forces. 
The  question  now  was — with  a  great  society  divided  into  social 
classes  widely  different  from  one  another  and  complicated  by  the 
division  of  labor — to  bring  about,  as  far  as  possible,  on  the  basis 
of  common  national  and  religious  feelings,  a  union  for  external 
defense  and  for  internal  justice  and  administration,  for  currency  and 
credit,  for  trade  interests  and  the  whole  economic  life,  which  should 
be  comparable  with  the  achievements,  in  its  time,  of  the  municipal 
government  in  relation  to  the  town  and  its  environs.  This  was  no 
mere  fancy  of  the  rulers;  it  was  the  innermost  need  of  the  higher 
civilization  itself  that  such   enlarged  and  strengthened   forms  of 

social  and  economic  community  should  come  into  existence 

The  whole  internal  history  of  the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth  cen- 


lO  THE  CAMERALISTS 

tunes,  trot  only  in  Germany,  but  everywhere  else,  is  summed  up  in  the 
opposition  of  the  economic  policy  of  the  state  to  that  of  th^  town,  the 
district,  and  the  several  Estates;  the  whole  foreign  history  Is  summed 
up  in  the  opposition  to  one  another  of  the  separate  interests  of  the 
newly  rising  states,  each  of  which  sought  to  obtain  and  retain  its 
place  in  the  circle  of  European  nations,  and  in  that  foreign  trade 

which  now  included  America  and  India 

Only  he  who  thus  conceives  of  mercantilism  will  understand  it; 
in  its  innermost  kernel  it  is  nothing  but  state  making — not  state 
making  in  a  narrow  sense,  but  state  making  and  national -economy 
making  at  the  same  time;  state  making  in  the  modem  sense,  which 
creates  out  of  the  political  community  an  economic  community, 
and  so  gives  it  a  heightened  meaning.  The  essence  of  the  system 
lies  not  in  some  doctrine  of  money,  or  of  the  balance  of  trade ;  not 
in  tariff  barriers,  protective  duties  or  navigation  laws;  but  in  some- 
thing far  greater,  namely,  in  the  total  transforiftation  of  society  and 
its  organization,  as  well  as  of  the  state  and  its  institutions,  in  the 
replacing  of  a  local  and  territorial  economic  policy  by  that  of  the 
national  state.  With  this  accords  the  fact  lately' pointed  out  with 
regard  to  the  literary  history  of  the  movement,  that  what  is  peculiar 
to  all  the  mercantilist  writers  is  not  so  much  the  regulations  of  trade 
which  they  propose  for  the  increase  of  the  precious  metals  as  the 
stress  they  lay  on  the  active  circulation  of  money,  especially  within 
the  state  itself.* 

The  last  sentence  in  this  quotation  from  SchmoUer  suggests 
the  peculiar  relation  of  the  cameralists  to  mercantilism  upon 
which  we  shall  try  to  show  that  their  writings  prove  tradition 
to  be  misleading.  Mercantilism,  the  instinctive  national 
policy  of  states  in  the  process  of  evolution,  while  at  the  same 
time  in  miscellaneous  struggle  with  other  states,  was  the  most 
prominent  objective  reality  in  the  civic  life  of  the  time.  On 
the  other  hand,  later  writers  about  mercantilism  have  created 

*  For  Schmoller's  later  views  on  this  main  theme,  and  especially 
for  bibliography  of  the  various  phases  of  the  subject,  vide  Grundriss, 
Index,  title  "Mercantilismus,"  etc. 


INTRODUCTION  TO  CAMERALISM  n 

a  grotesque  mythology  of  the,  political  and  economic  theory 
supposed  to  have  been  held  by  the  supporters  of  the  p(jlicy. 
The  present  study  does  not  extend  to  mercantilistic  theorists 
outside  of  Germany.  While  we  are  prepared,  in  the  proper 
place,  to  challenge  the  credibility  of  this  mythology  as  it  applies 
to  other  countries,  our  propositions  in  this  book  refer  not  merely 
to  German  theorists  alone,  but  to  the  cameralistic  group 
among  those  theorists.  The  cameralists  are  generally  reputed 
to  have  been  typical  mercantilists,  in  the  sense  that  they  are 
alleged  to  have  taught  certain  economic  doctrines  implied  by 
the  mercantilistic  policy.  One  of  the  results  of  appeal  to  the 
cameralistic  books  themselves  is  proof  that  mercantilism  in  the 
supposed  sense,  that  is,  as  a  specific  system  of  false  economic 
generalizations,  cannot  be  found  in  these  sources. 

Adam  Smith  did  much  to  create  belief  in  this  mythological 
mercantilism.  When  we  analyze  his  chapter  on  "The  Prin- 
ciple of  the  Commercial  or  Mercantile  System,"'  we  find  that 
it  produced  its  efifect  in  this  direction  more  by  innuendo  than 
by  precise  assertion.    The  chapter  begins  with  the  sentence: 

That  wealth  consists  in  money,  or  in  gold  and  silver,  is  a  popular 
notion  which  naturally  arises  from  the  double  function  of  money, 
as  the  instrument  of  commerce,  and  as  the  measure  of  value. 

The  poison  in  the  sentence  gets  its  venom  in  part  by  asso- 
ciation with  the  title  of  Book  IV,  "Of  Systems  of  Political 
Economy,"  and  with  the  subtitle  of  chap.  i.  The  reader  under- 
stands Smith  to  imply  that  there  have  been  systems  of  "politi- 
cal economy"  based  on  the  idea  that  "wealth  consists  in  money, 
or  in  gold  and  silver;"  and  that  there  was  a  "commercial  or 
mercantile  system  "  which  posited  this  principle.  It  turns  out 
in  the  first  place  that  Smith  did  not  distinguish,  in  this  part  of 
his  work,  between  "  political  economy "  as  a  theory,  and  eco- 
nomic policy.    He  asserts  that  interested  parties  have  succeeded 

'  Wealth  oj  Nations,  Book  IV,  chap.  i. 


12  THE  CAMERALISTS 

in  persuading  nations  to  act  as  though  money  were  the  only 
wealth,  and  thereupon  he  indulges  in  a  homily  upon  the  absurd- 
ity of  that  idea.  Nevertheless,  he  concludes*  that  a  system 
of  "political  economy"  which  rested  on  this  absurdity  widely 
prevailed.     Thus  he  says: 

The  two  principles  being  established,  however,  that  wealth  con- 
sisted in  gold  and  silver,  and  that  those  metals  could  be  brought 
into  a  countr)'  which  had  no  mines  only  by  the  balance  of  trade,  or 
by  exporting  to  a  greater  value  than  it  imported ;  it  necessarily  became 
the  great  object  of  political  economy  (sic)  to  diminish  as  much  as 
possible  the  importation  of  foreign  goods  for  home  consumption, 
and  to  increase  as  much  as  possible  the  exportation  of  the  produce 
of  domestic  industry. 

A  history  of  the  growth  of  this  mercantilistic  myth  would 
he  instructive,  and  it  is  to  be  hoped  that  it  will  some  day  be 
written.  We  may  content  ourselves  with  a  single  comparatively 
modern  and  somewhat  more  full-grown  version  of  the  same 
fiction,  this  time  by  a  writer  who  may  fairly  be  presumed  to 
have  inclurled  the  Germans  more  directly  in  his  generalization 
than  was  probably  the  case  with  Smith.*  This  historian  of 
political  science  says: 

The  Mercantile  System,  then,  or  Colbcrtism,  was  the  first  attempt 
to  put  the  fundamental  principles  of  the  theory  of  management 
[W'irlhschajlslehre]  on  a  scientific  and  orderly  basis.  The  central 
point  oj  the  same  was  the  attribution  oj  exclusive  value  to  the  precious 
metals.'^  Consequently  the  effort  in  every  possible  way  to  acquire 
gold  and  silver,  and  to  retain  the  same:  hence  also  the  anxiety  for 
a  favorable  balance  of  trade.  The  means  relied  upon  were:  exclu- 
sive (sic)  promotion  of  the  transforming  industries,  and  of  foreign 
trade,  espx-cially  attainable  through  privileges,  advances  of  capital, 
precise   regulations  for  industries,  monopolies,  favorable  commer- 

'  Bax  ed.,  \'(>l.  1,  p.  450. 

»  Vf>n  .Mohl,  Geschichte  und  Literatur  der  Staatsu'issenschajlen,  III. 
Bd.  (1858),  p.  296. 

3  Italic  s  mine. 


INTRODUCTION  TO  CAMERALISM  13 

cial  treaties  and  exclusive  relations  with  colonies;  then  prohibition 
of  the  export  of  the  precious  metals,  and  of  raw  materials  fit  for 
domestic  manufacture. 

Nothing  is  easier  than  to  show  conclusively  the  incorrectness 
of  the  fundamental  idea,  as  well  as  the  impropriety  of  the  means 
employed.  It  would  therefore  be  a  waste  of  time  to  stop  for  discus- 
sion of  the  absolute  truth  of  the  system.  At  the  same  time,  the  ques- 
tion of  its  relative  value  for  the  times  and  circumstances  is  not  to 
be  disposed  of  in  the  same  way.  It  has  long  since  been  observed 
by  others  that  this  first  system  of  political  economy  (sic)  was  not  a 
product  of  minds  exploring  truth  with'  a  distinctly  conscious  pur- 
pose. It  was  rather  the  generalization  of  the  actual  programme  of 
certain  eminent  statesmen,  particularly  Colbert.^  It  is  equally  easy 
to  prove,  however,  that  the  essential  fundamental  idea  of  these 
statesmen,  and  therewith  of  the  system  built  upon  it,  emerged  neces- 
sarily from  the  economic  condition  of  Europe  after  the  middle  of 
the  seventeenth  century.  The  accumulation  of  great  sums  of  money 
for  defraying  the  costs  of  war  and  supplying  the  luxury  of  courts 
was  the  involuntary  task  of  the  officials  intrusted  with  the  manage- 
ment of  states.  This  task  could  be  discharged  easiest,  not  to  say 
solely,  by  constant  increase  of  the  export  of  goods.  These  were 
wanted  in  the  newly  accessible  parts  of  the  world,  and  would  be  paid 
for  in  gold  and  silver.  0}  a  basing  of  popular  welfare,  and  therewith 
of  the  income  of  the  crown,  upon  more  prosperous  agriculture,  not  a 
word  could  he  said;  partly  because  of  the  lack  of  all  rational  knowledge 
of  agricultural  economy  on  the  part  of  the  landed  gentry,  together 
with  the  utterly  suppressed  condition  of  the  peasantry,  partly  because 
the  development  of  this  source  of  wealth  could  not  keep  pace  with 
the  above-mentioned  need. 

Such  mixtures  of  Wahrheit  und  Dichtung  are  the  substitutes 
for  objective  interpretation  of  the  cameralistic  period  which 
our  generation  has  inherited,  and  we  have  accepted  them  almost 

'  Von  Mohl  fails  to  discover,  and  consequently  helps  to  add  vogue 
to,  the  fallacy  of  the  whole  generalization.  He  does  not  perceive  that 
the  generalizers  put  into  the  system  what  they  thought  it  should  be  made 
responsible  for,  instead  of  finding  out  what  its  followers  actually  thought. 


14  THE  CAMERALISTS 

without  question.  How  far  from  the  truth  was  the  last  sen- 
tence in  the  quotation  may  be  inferred  from  the  bibliography 
of  agriculture  published  by  Zincke.^ 

Now  the  fact  is  that  "mercantilism"  as  political  economy, 
in  the  sense  at  present  associated  with  that  term,  in  contrast 
with  political  policy,  did  not  exist  among  the  cameralists. 
This  was,  first,  because  political  economy  was  not  bom  till 
after  their  time,  and  second,  because  such  material  for  political 
economy  as  was  contained  in  their  theories  was  wonderfully 
sound,  as  far  as  it  went,  on  the  meaning  of  money  and  the 
precious  metals.  It  is  as  absurd  to  charge  the  theorists  of 
the  mercantilistic  period  with  the  economic  vagaries  of  which 
(by  inference  from  the  opportunistic  policies  of  the  governments 
which  they  served,  and  which  they  themselves  to  a  certain 
extent  approved)  our  modem  logic  might  prove  them  construct- 
ively guilty,  as  it  would  be  to  charge  the  economists  of  England 
today  with  dogmas  which  might  be  deduced  from  generaliza- 
tion of  British  policy  in  the  Boer  war.  Mercantilism,  the 
policy,  was  war  more  than  it  was  philosophy.  It  was  the  prac- 
tical answer  to  the  practical  question,  What  is  the  practical 
thing  for  our  state  to  do  under  present  circumstances  ?  A  situa- 
tion might  easily  be  imagined  in  which,  with  a  war  to  be  fought 
at  a  distance  with  a  strong  nation,  the  people  of  the  United 
States,  irrespective  of  party  affiliations  or  economic  principles, 
might  afford  a  certain  type  of  reasoners  all  the  evidence  they 
would  want  for  the  assertion,  "The  people  of  the  United  States 
all  believe  that  coal  is  the  only  wealth."  The  conclusion  would 
have  essentially  the  same  sort  of  logical  support,  and  would 
have  the  same  degree  of  validity,  which  examination  of  the 
sources  discovers  in  the  case  of  the  cameralists  and  their  alleged 

'  Vide  below,  p.  242;  cf.  p.  256.  The  blurred  view  of  the  cameral- 
ists given  by  Cohn  is  still  more  notable,  because  Cohn's  book  has  prob- 
ably influenced  the  thinking  of  many  times  more  students  than  von 
Mohl's.     Vide  Crundriss  der  Nationalifhonomie,  1885,  pp.  99,  100. 


INTRODUCTION  TO  CAMERALISM  15 

mercantilism.  They  certainly  believed  in  a  mercantilistic 
policy.  They  certainly  did  not  believe  in  the  mercantilistic 
political  economy  which  has  been  charged  to  them  by  an  age 
that  does  not  understand  the  meaning  of  the  policy. 

Tradition  has  dealt  quite  as  uncritically  with  cameralistic 
beliefs  about  population.  They  have  been  represented  as 
directly  contrary  to  the  Malthusian  principle.  The  cameralists 
have  been  supposed  to  believe  unlimited  increase  of  the  number 
of  citizens  both  possible  and  desirable.  In  reality  the  Malthu- 
sian problem  never  distinctly  appeared  above  their  horizon. 
Their  beliefs  about  population  were  substantially  the  same 
beliefs  which  the  traffic  managers  of  our  western  railroads, 
and  the  farmers  of  the  prairie  states  act  upon  every  year  of 
abundant  crops.  They  assume  that  hands  enough  are  not 
to  be  had  for  harvesting.  The  cameralists  knew  as  well  as 
modern  economists  do  that  there  was  a  limit  beyond  which 
more  mouths  could  not  be  fed.  They  did  not  qualify  their 
statements  about  population  quite  as  carefully  as  men  must 
who  have  in  mind  the  Malthusian  chapter  in  economic  theory. 
Substantially,  however,  they  held  tenable  views  of  the  subject 
as  far  as  they  went,  and  their  efforts  to  promote  j)opulati<)n 
would  propably  be  duplicated  today,  under  parallel  circum- 
stances, by  the  most  convinced  Malthusians  in  the  world. 

Perhaps  the  most  radical  misunderstanding  of  the  cameral- 
ists, especially  on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic,  is  in  connection  with 
their  theories  of  absolutism.  To  Americans,  absolutism  is 
so  unthinkable  as  a  principle  of  political  philosophy,  that 
nothing  tolerable  can  be  credited  to  theories  in  which  such  a 
postulate  is  a  factor.  But  Americans  would  have  become 
much  profounder  political  philosophers  than  they  are,  if  they 
had  been  patient  enough  to  learn  a  little  more  about  the  part 
which  the  fiction  of  absolutism  has  performed  in  the  process 
of  civic  evolution.  They  might  have  become  more  docile  if 
they  had  perceived  that  the  European  superstition  of  the  abso- 


l6  THE  CAMERALISTS 

lutism  of  rulers  differs  more  in  degree  than  in  kind  from  the 
American  superstition  of  the  absolutism  of  the  constitution. 
The  truth  is,  each  of  these  illusions  was  a  legal  fiction  which 
promoted  social  control  by  expressing  in  the  most  vivid  way 
practicable  the  enormous  value  of  obedience  to  the  accepted 
authorities.  Each  of  these  fictions  was  the  idiom  in  which 
an  age  said,  in  its  most  impressive  way,  "The  law  must  be 
obeyed."  Americans  have  been  taught  so  exclusively  the  dark 
phases  of  absolutistic  regimes  that  they  resent  suggestion  of 
factors  in  the  case  which  they  have  not  considered.  While 
absolutism  as  a  principle  is  indefensible,  it  has  been  of  incal- 
culable service  as  a  makeshift;  and  sometimes,  notably  in  the 
case  of  most  of  the  cameralists,  the  absolutistic  element  which 
occupied  the  place  of  honor  in  the  formal  philosophy  of  the 
state  was  subordinated  in  effect  by  the  moral  force  of  judgments 
which  made  steadily  in  the  direction  of  more  authentic  civic 
principles. 

But  we  must  indicate  the  central  motive  of  the  cameralists 
in  a  positive  way.  Apart  from  all  details,  whether  on  the 
credit  or  debit  side,  the  salient  fact  about  the  cameralistic  civic 
theory  wan  its  fundamental  assumption  of  the  paramount  value 
of  the  collective  interests,  or  in  other  words  the  subordination 
of  the  interests  of  the  individual  to  the  interests  of  the  community. 
The  absolutistic  state,  of  which  cameralism  was  the  theory, 
used  means  and  methods  which  are  out  of  the  question  for 
democracies.  That  same  absolutistic  state  maintained  cer- 
tain scales  of  social  value,  and  arrived  at  certain  types  of  con- 
crete result,  to  which  democracies  thus  far  have  not  attained. 
Whether  we  will  or  no,  human  experience  is  social.  The  type 
of  association  is  more  important  to  the  continuous  process  of 
human  achievement  than  the  choices  of  individuals.  Whether 
any  society  has  found  the  just  balance  between  social  ascend- 
ency and  individual  liberty,  the  principle  that  social  ascendency 
must  practically  outrank  private  preference  is  vital  to  civiliza- 


INTRODUCTION  TO  CAMERALISM  17 

tion.  Whether  the  Germans  have  overemphasized  the  col- 
lectivistic  principle,  future  centuries  must  decide.  Even  if 
Americans  are  unprepared  to  concede  that  our  democracy 
has  given  individualism  too  much  license,  it  will  be  the  part 
of  wisdom  for  us  to  inspect  the  achievements  of  German  col- 
lectivism without  deciding  in  advance  that  they  contain  nothing 
from  which  Americans  can  derive  instruction. 

Whether  the  coUectivistic  principle  is  ever  beneficially 
to  modify  democracy  or  not,  there  is  hardly  room  for  debate 
upon  the  proposition  that  in  sheer  economy  of  social  efficiency 
Germany  has  no  near  rival  among  the  great  nations.  Whether 
the  method  of  this  achievement  costs  more  than  it  is  worth,  is 
an  open  question.  That,  in  view  of  what  it  has  accomplished, 
it  is  worth  understanding,  is  beyond  dispute.  The  explanation 
of  the  German  type  of  success  cannot  be  reached  without  cal- 
culating the  significance  of  the  cameralists. 

It  has  passed  into  a  world's  proverb  that  the  German  school- 
master won  the  campaign  of  Sedan.  It  would  be  a  superficial 
version  of  that  approximate  truth,  if  the  schoolmaster  in  the 
case  were  supposed  to  be  the  pedagogue  who  taught  the  men 
in  the  three  columns  that  crossed  the  Rhine.  The  school  in 
which  the  wonderful  proficiency  of  modem  Germany  was 
trained  was  its  whole  civic  system.  No  part  of  the  machinery 
of  modem  history  has  been  regarded  more  contemptuously 
by  the  rest  of  the  world  than  the  petty  German  principalities. 
They  were  ignoble  and  obstructive  enough,  to  be  sure,  but  this 
is  not  the  complete  account.  Each,  with  its  minute  cameralis- 
tic  organization,  functioned  like  the  drill  sergeants  with  the 
raw  levies.  The  incapable  masses  of  the  German  people 
were  divided  into  squads,  and  disciplined  fOr  civic  duties,  and 
after  the  dull  drill  of  centuries  were  delivered  over  to  the  united 
nation  as  the  most  completely  socialized  citizens  in  modern 
European  history. 

Without  attempting  to  determine  the  precise  degree  of 


1 8  THE  CAMERALISTS 

influence  which  each  theorist,  or  the  government  behind  him, 
exerted  upon  the  development  of  cameralism,  we  may  begin 
with  a  rapid  sketch  of  the  more  prominent  text -writers.  In 
general  it  is  needless  to  bring  into  this  account  Vjiographical 
material  in  addition  to  that  to  be  found  in  Die  allgemeine 
deutsche  Biographie.  While  it  is  necessary  to  base  our  work 
u[)on  the  presumyjtion  of  familiarity  with  Roschcr,'-  the  argu- 
ment of  this  book  is  a  direct  challenge  of  the  correctness  of 
Roscher's  interyjretation.'  We  shall  go  to  the  writings  of  the 
cameralists  themselves  for  direct  evidence  of  the  presump- 
tions, the  content,  and  the  sociological  significance  of  their 
system. 

The  term  Kammer,  derivatives  of  which  have  been  trans- 
literated into  English  to  denote  a  theory  and  practice  for  which 
Englishmen  have  no  e.xact  equivalent,  is  itself  a  variant  of  the 
Latin  camera,  in  turn  from  the  Greek  Kafidpa.^  Cameralism 
was  the  routine  of  the  bureaus  in  which  the  administrative 
em]:>loyees  of  governments,  first  of  all  in  the  fiscal  departments, 
did  their  work;  or  in  a  larger  sense  it  was  systematized  govern- 
mental procedure,  the  application  of  which  was  made  in  the 
arlministrative  bureaus. 

Roscher  distinguishes  in  the  second  half  of  the  seventeenth 

'  Ge.Khichte  der  Xalional-Oekonomik  in  Deulschland. 

'  While  Ros<her  partially  corrects  an  error,  yet  he  rehabilitates  it 
at  the  same  time  in  another  form:  Zur  Geschichle  der  englischen  Volks- 
u-irthschajlstehre,  p.  122. 

1  Lidrlell  and  Srcnt:  "anything  with  a  vaulted  rooi  or  arched  ccner- 
Ing;"  Heyse,  Fremdworterhuch:  "'camera  or  Kammer  in  the  more  restricted 
sense  is  the  apartment  where  the  counselors  charged  with  administration 
f»f  the  revenues  of  a  principality  assemhled:  then  the  persons  them- 
selves, Kammerruthe  and  Kammer-Assessoren."  Cameralia,  or  Cameral- 
IVis^enschajten,  were  the  theories  r<n  which  aclministration  of  the  revenues 
prfKfeded;  in  a  wider  sense  the  term  was  applied  to  the  sciences  of  the 
state  in  general.  .\  cameralist  was  one  who  understcjod  these  sciences 
either  theoretically  or  in  practice. 


INTRODUCTION  TO  CAMERALISM  19 

century  three  principal  tendencies  among  the  German  national 
economists:* 

first  a  practical-conservative  tendency,  which  had  its  chief  seat  in 
the  small  territories  of  middle  Germany  and  was  best  represented 
by  SeckendorflF.  Then  a  purely  scientific  tendency,  belonging  almost 
wholly  in  the  north  of  Germany,  where  as  typical  contrasts  Pufendorf 
and  Conring  loom  up.  A  third  group,  viz.,  the  practical-progressive, 
attaches  itself  most  closely  in  part  to  Austria,  in  part  to  the  great 
Electors. 

It  begs  the  question  at  the  outset,  to  use  the  phrase  with  which 
Roscher  begins  detailed  discussion  of  these  tendencies.  To 
speak  of  "the  conservative  national  economics"*  in  the  second 
half  of  the  seventeenth  century  in  Germany  is  to  imply  that 
there  already  was  a  systematic  economics  in  the  sense  in  which 
that  phrase  was  understood  two  hundred  years  later,  when 
Roscher  wrote.  It  is  certainly  not  true  that  an  economic 
theory  existed  in  Germany  at  that  time  in  the  sense  carried 
by  the  phrase  in  England  since  Adam  Smith.    It  would  be 

'  Geschichte  der  National-Oekonomik  in  Deutschland,  p.  237.  I  shall 
urge  later  (p.  49;  cf.  pp.  195,  196)  that  it  is  necessary  to  supply  English- 
speaking  students  with  a  commentary  on  this  term,  if  they  are  to  be  pro- 
tected against  misconceptions  of  historical  facts.  The  term  "  Notional- 
okonomik"  corresponds  with  what  existed  in  Germany  in  the  seventeenth 
and  eighteenth  centuries,  only  if  it  has  the  force  of  the  phrase  "national 
management."  This  management  included  morals,  education,  religion, 
politics,  diplomacy,  war,  and  finance,  much  more  directly  and  intensively 
than  it  concerned  itself  with  economic  questions  as  understood  in 
England  and  America.  It  is  an  anachronism  therefore  to  credit  Ger- 
many, before  Adam  Smith's  critique  of  economic  relations  was  imported 
and  domesticated,  with  an  economic  science  in  the  British  sense.  The 
men  in  Germany  who  theorized  about  civic  interests  before  the  close  of  the 
eighteenth  century  were  political  scientists  after  their  kind.  They  were 
political  economists  only  in  a  secondary  and  incidental  sense.  This 
distinction  is  crucial  for  the  interpretation  of  all  the  social  sciences  in 
Germany  from  this  point 

•  Loc.  cit.,  p.  338. 


30  THE  CAMERALISTS 

less  difficult  to  support  a  claim  that  economics  in  Germany 
in  the  second  half  of  the  nineteenth  century  was  merely  a  more 
highly  developed  form  of  the  theory  which  constituted  the  social 
science  of  the  cameralists.  This  would  however  at  best  be  a 
misleading  version  of  the  facts.  Economic  science  in  Germany 
was  merely  a  subordinate  and  subconscious  factor  in  the  came- 
ralistic  theory  of  governmental  management.  It  had  not 
gained  independence  as  a  science  of  wealth  relations,  irre- 
spective of  the  forms  of  government  under  which  they  exist. 
The  economic  presumptions  of  the  cameralists,  whether 
essentially  sound  or  not,  were  at  first  merely  the  folklore  of 
homely  thrift,  not  critical  analyses  of  general  economic  rela- 
tions. In  the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth  centuries  the  center 
of  social  interest  was  civic,  not  economic.  With  this  theorem 
as  our  point  of  departure  we  are  bound  to  arrive  at  a  revised 
version  of  the  economic  theories  of  the  period.* 

»  Readers  who  want  the  author's  conclusions,  but  who  are  unwilling 
to  examine  his  evidence,  may  pass  from  this  point  to  the  Ifist  chapter.     ^ ' 


CHAPTER  II 
THE  CIVICS  OF  OSSE 

If  the  purpose  of  this  book  were  to  trace  minutely  the 
evolution  of  cameralism,  our  problem  would  lead  back  into 
investigation  of  generations  of  men,  princes  and  their  servants, 
of  whom  Osse  was  in  many  ways  typical.  Such  an  inquiry 
would  take  us  far  beyond  the  scope  of  the  present  study.  It 
would  be  rather  an  investigation  of  the  history  of  German 
political  institutions  in  general,  especially  after  the  Reforma- 
tion, than  interpretation  of  a  single  quasi-academic  factor  in 
that  civic  development.  It  would  bring  to  the  center  of  atten- 
tion quite  different  types  of  evidence  from  that  to  which  this 
argument  is  restricted.  Osse  functioned  chiefly  as  an  agent 
of  princes  at  a  time  when  the  territorial  sovereignty  of  the  Ger- 
man rulers  was  still  undecided,  and  when  the  administration 
of  German  states  was  in  an  early  formative  stage.  His  activity 
as  an  author  was  relatively  accidental,  yet  his  influence  in  this 
character  was  incomparably  more  lasting  than  in  any  other. 
He  is  cited  here,  however,  rather  as  a  means  of  marking  the 
relativity  of  the  writers  to  be  noticed  more  at  length,  than  as 
properly  within  the  bounds  of  the  present  survey. 

Osse  was  bom  in  the  hamlet  of  Ossa,  near  the  obscure 
town  of  Geithain,  in  1506.  He  studied  law  at  Leipzig,  was 
"scholarly,  conscientious,  laborious,  gentle  and  deeply  pious."' 
He  served- for  a  time  in  the  army;  for  several  years  he  occupied 
the  chief  lectureship  in  law  at  Leipzig;  in  1537  he  was  men- 
tioned by  Zamcke  as  consUiarius  Misnensis;  he  remained  a 
counselor  of  Herzog  Georg  till  the  death  of  the  latter;  passed 
to  the  service  of  Herzog  Moritz,  1541;  the  same  year  was 
released  by  Moritz  to  enter  the  service  of  the  elector  Johann 

«  Diestel  in  AUgemeine  deutsche  Biographie,  title  "Osse." 

31 


22  THE  CAMERALISTS 

Friedrich,  where  he  remained  as  chancellor  for  six  years. 
There  are  confusions  in  dates  at  this  period,  but  after  employ- 
ment of  uncertain  length  at  Meiningen,  Osse  was  in  1 547  made 
Ho/richter  in  Leipzig,  In  1550  he  represented  the  elector 
at  the  Diet  of  Augsburg.  On  account  of  ill  health  he  with- 
drew from  his  judgeship  in  1555,  and  composed  the  document 
which  is  his  chief  title  to  a  place  in  history.     He  died  in  1556. 

A  more  searching  inquiry  into  the  personal  record  of  Osse 
is  unnecessary.  In  spite  of  the  author's  own  usage,  and  that 
of  his  editor  Thomasius,  which  we  follow,  Roscher  uses  the 
form  "Ossa,"  corresponding  to  the  acepted  spelling  of  his 
birthplace. 

It  appears  further  that,  in  spite  of  his  prestige  at  Leipzig, 
Osse  was  not  in  full  favor  with  the  Saxon  theologians.  The 
complete  story  of  this  phase  of  his  career  would  take  us  far 
afield,  in  the  general  culture-history  of  the  period,  and  we  must 
pass  it  with  a  mere  hint.  Philipp  Melanchthon  soundly  berated 
Osse  and  five  other  advisers  of  Herzog  Moritz,  and  he  embel- 
lished one  of  his  denunciations  with  the  couplet : 
Hiengen  die  Sechs  an  einen  Strick. 
Das  war  Sachsen  und  Meissen  Gluck.* 

The  editor,  Thomasius,  implies  that  the  reputation  thus  referred 
to  made  Osse  uncomfortable  at  the  court  of  Johann  Friedrich, 
and  accounts  for  his  resignation.  Thomasius  protests,  how- 
ever, that  he  can  find  no  adequate  ground  for  Osse's  bad 
repute  with  the  elector.  While  declining  to  enter  into  the 
merits  of  the  case,  he  submits  this  consideration,  viz.: 

Philipp  Melanthon  (sic)  was  no  angel  himself,  and  there  are 
proofs  enough  that  not  everything  which  came  from  Melancthon 
as  a  judgment  of  other  men  can  be  taken  as  a  divine  truth  or  an 
infallible  gospel. 

At  bottom,  the  case  against  Osse  appears  to  have  been 
that  his  break  with  traditional  religious  ideas  was  not  as  com- 

»  Testament,  ed.  Thorn.,  171 7,  "Vorredc,"  p.  10. 


CIVICS  OF  OSSE  23 

plete  as  the  Lutherans  demanded.  He  was  accused  of 
being  still  at  heart  a  papist.  In  commenting  upon  this  charge, 
Thomasius  furnishes  the  interesting  item  that  Osse's  copious 
quotations  from  the  Vulgate,  instead  of  the  Lutheran  version, 
were  among  the  most  damaging  evidences  of  his  guilt. 

We  turn  directly  to  the  Testament,  the  document  which 
entitles  its  author  to  rank  as  a  forerunner  of  the  seventeenth- 
and  eighteenth-century  cameralists.*  It  is  a  monograph 
written  in  the  last  year  of  its  author's  life,  and  by  command 
of  his  prince,  and  was  intended,  both  by  prince  and  his  emeri- 
tus adviser,  to  serve  the  purpose  for  which  Adam  Smith  later 
invoked  the  hypothesis  of  "the  impartial  spectator." 

The  form  in  which  the  document  is  now  most  accessible 
is  the  edition  of  Christian  Thomasius,  the  man  who  is  reputed 
to  have  been  the  first  in  Germany  to  introduce  the  innovation 
of  academic  lectures  in  the  vulgar  language.  At  the  time  of 
his  discovery  of  the  document,  he  was  an  important  factor  in 
the  influence  of  the  University  of  Halle,  of  which  he  is  called 
one  of  the  founders.  We  shall  have  occasion  to  refer  to  him 
again  in  his  proper  chronological  place.  At  present  we  need 
to  cite  only  a  few  details  in  which  he  has  thrown  light  upon 
Osse. 

*  D.  Melchiors  von  Osse  "Testament."  Gegen  Hertzog  Augusto 
Ckurfilrsten  zu  Sachsen.  Sr.  Churfiirst.  Gnaden  Rdthen  und  Land- 
schafften.  1556.  Anitzo  zum  ersten  tnahl  vollig  gedruckt.  Auch  hin 
und  wieder  durch  nutsliclu  A  nmerckungen  Erldutert.  Nebst  einer  Vorrcde 
und  Anhang  von  einen  Versuch  kleiner  " Annalium"  den  damahligen 
Zustand  so  wohl  bey  Hoje  als  auf  Universitdten  desto  deutlicher  sich  cin- 
zubilden.  Zum  Gebrauch  des  Tfiomasischen  "  Auditorii."  Halle  hti 
Magdeburgisch.  A.  MDCCXVII.  A  portion  of  the  author's  special 
title-page  to  the  body  of  the  document  reads:  "  Welchergestalt  eine 
Christliche  Obrigkeit  ingemein,  in  ihrem  Regiment  mit  Gottes  Hiilffe  eine 
gottselige,  weissliche  verniinfftige  und  rechtmassige  Justicien  erhalten 
kan.  Darum  auch  Erwehnung  geschieht  von  dem  Regiment.  Gericht- 
barkeit  und  Policey  der  l6blichen  Chur-  und  Furstenthum  Sachsen, 
Thiiringen,  und  Meissen,  Hochermeldtem  Churfvirsten  zustandig." 


94  THE  CAMERALISTS 

In  the  first  i)lace,  Thomasius  says,  in  the  Preface  to  the 
document,  that  he  was  first  shown  the  imperfect  manuscript, 
(apparently  in  1707)  in  the  Furstliclie  Bibliotlick  at  Wolffen- 
biittel.  He  adds  that  up  to  that  time  it  was  unknown  to  him, 
and  he  had  not  even  seen  the  portions  that  had  been  printed. 
Later  he  bought  the  full  manuscript  at  an  auction.  Thomasius 
appears  to  have  recognized  in  Osse  a  man  after  his  own  heart. 
Replying  to  the  supposed  challenge,  \\  hy  publish  the  book 
of  a  man  about  whom  so  many  suspicions  existed  ?  he  says 
{V  or  rede,  p.  16): 

The  author  is  the  first  of  those  counselors  known  to  us  who 
gave  their  opinion  as  to  the  way  in  which  the  judicial  system  is 
to  be  improved.  The  first  usually  breaks  the  ice,  and  cannot  accom- 
plish all,  but  he  leaves  the  rest  to  his  successors. 

The  document  as  we  have  it  cKcupies,  with  the  editor's 
notes,  548  pages.  In  the  same  binding,  and  filling  264  pages, 
is  Thomasius'  collection  of  materials  on  the  history  of  the  Uni- 
versity of  Leipzig.  The  title  of  the  c(^llection  is  Ein  kleiner 
Versuch  von  Anualibiis.  The  editing  of  Osse's  work  was  in 
Thomasius'  mind  a  propagandist  measure,  and  as  he  regarded 
improvement  of  the  educational  system  as  the  key  to  the  whole 
problem,  it  was  api)r()i)riale  to  issue  the  seemingly  unlike  docu- 
ments together.  It  ai)pears  that  Thomasius  wanted  to  publish 
a  treatise  on  political  reform,  with  reference  both  to  the  Roman 
and  the  Canon  law.  The  difficulties  proved  too  great,  and 
he  chose  to  make  Osse's  document  the  vehicle  of  some  of  his 
ideas.  His  notes  on  the  text  number  271.  The  Testament 
itself  contains  only  118  sections.  Although  the  notes  are  in 
much  smaller  type  than  the  text,  a  rough  estimate  siiows  that 
they  fill,  in  the  aggregate,  about  one-half  the  whole  space.  If 
we  should  fully  analyze  both  text  and  notes,  we  should  find 
in  them  two  separate  monuments,  of  two  stadia  of  development 
in  political  philosophy,  previous  to  that  marked  by  the  most 
complete  form  of  cameralism.     For  that  reason  we  shall  not 


CIVICS  OF  OSSE  25 

undertake  here  a  detailed  account  either  of  Osse  or  of  Thoma- 
sius.  Their  determining  purpose  was  not  identical  with  that 
of  cameralism  proper.  On  the  whole,  they  had  their  center 
in  other  groups,  with  which  this  book  does  not  attempt  to  deal. 
We  may  simply  note  in  these  two  writers  certain  germs  which 
must  be  examined  in  more  developed  form  in  later  theorists. 
One  who  knew  nothing  of  the  history  of  the  German  lan- 
guage, or  of  its  geographical  variations,  who  assumed  that  its 
growth  was  in  a  straight  line,  and  who  drew  conclusions  from 
literary  form  alone,  would  promptly  place  Osse's  Testament 
much  later  than  Obrecht's  Secreta  Politica;^  perhaps  even 
later  than  Becher.'  Of  course  the  use  of  Latin  by  the  side 
of  German  in  the  Obrecht  collection  strengthens  the  impres- 
sion of  age.  Osse's  sjnitax,  as  well  as  his  vocabulary, 
approaches  closer  than  that  of  either  of  these  writers  to  modem 
usage.  According  to  Thomasius'  statement  {Vorrede,  p.  33), 
this  is  not  to  be  attributed  to  the  editor.  He  says  that  he 
changed  little  or  nothing  in  the  style,  with  the  single  exception 
of  substituting  the  word  oder  in  frequent  cases  for  Osse's  word 
aher.  Osse's  own  statement  of  his  reason  for  writing  in  Ger- 
man is  as  follows: 

The  motives  which  have  moved  me  to  set  down  my  opinions 
in  the  German  language,  are  not  for  the  sake  of  His  Electoral  Grace, 
who,  God  be  praised,  was  in  his  youth  thoroughly  instructed  in  the 
Latin  tongue  and  good  arts,  but  rather  the  consideration  that  this 
memorial  might  come  to  the  knowledge  of  laymen,  untaught  in  the 
Latin  language,  and  the  desire  that  they  might  not  be  hindered  in 
reading  it  by  the  intermixture  of  many  Latin  words.^ 

Osse  begins  the  Testament  with  a  paragraph  which  we 
translate  as  closely  as  possible : 

It  is  among  all  wise  people  beyond  dispute,  that  every  magistracy 
(Obrigkeit)  may  prove  and  make  evident  its  virtue  and  aptitude  in 

«  Vide  pp.  40  ff.  below.  3  Zuschrifft,  pp.  8  ff. 

»  Vide  pp.  107  ff.  below. 


26  THE  CAMERALISTS 

two  ways.  First,  in  time  of  war,  through  manly  deeds,  good  sagacious 
projects,  and  protection  of  their  lands  and  subjects,  second,  in  time 
of  peace,  through  ordering  and  maintaining  of  good  godly  righteous 
government,  judiciary,  and  Policey.^  For  with  these  two  every 
magistracy  should  necessarily  be  adorned  and  supplied,  in  order  that 
in  every  time  of  war  and  peace  they  {sic)  may  be  able  well  to  govern, 
protect,  control  and  defend  their  own. 

Osse  then  enlarges  briefly  upon  the  duties  which  belong 
to  the  niler  in  time  of  war;  but  he  dismisses  this  side  of  the 
case  as  beyond  his  competence.  As  to  the  other  class  of  duties, 
he  continues  (p.  33) : 

As  to  what  concerns  the  government  in  times  of  peace,  I  will 
write,  as  much  as  God  vouchsafes  me  grace,  for  He  is  the  ground 
on  which  all  must  be  built  which  is  good,  and  wherever  such  ground 
is  lacking  there  follows  no  permanent  building. 

The  author  promises  to  set  dovm  truly  all  that  he  has 
observed  in  the  service  of  five  electors  of  Saxony,  the  fifth  then 
living.  He  frequently  repeats  that  he  is  doing  this  not  of  his 
own  motion,  but  at  the  command  of  the  elector.  We  may 
safely  assume  that  the  passage  immediately  following  represents 
Osse's  fundamental  opinions  as  well  as  they  could  be  pictured. 
He  says  (p.  33) : 

Such  a  command  I  am  not  at  liberty  to  disregard,  and  for  this 
reason  I  lay  down  first  of  all  the  following  ground.  All  that  I  here- 
after write  will  be  built  upon  it.  It  must  also  be  observed  with 
special  diligence. 

Government  over  men  is  such  a  high,  precious  and  wonderful 
thing,  that  no  human  being,  no  matter  how  excellent  in  understand- 
ing, reason  and  wit,  is  to  be  intrusted  with  exercising  it  according 
to  his  own  will,  caprice  and  opinion,  for  such  government  is  a  higher 
thing  than  that  the  exercise  of  it  could  belong  to  one  over  others  who 
by  nature  are  of  one  origin  with  him,  which  same  may  be  known 
from  all  races  of  animals,  since  a  flock  of  sheep  does  not  allow  itself 

I  The  reasons  for  allowing  this  term  to  stand  in  its  German  form 
will  appear  later. 


CIVICS  OF  OSSE  27 

to  be  ruled  by  a  sheep,  nor  a  drove  of  horses  or  cattle  by  one  of  their 
own  kind,  but  rather  for  such  government  something  else  is  necessary, 
which  is  higher  and  better  than  the  other  beasts.  Now  man,  who 
in  many  ways  surpasses  the  other  animals,  for  the  like  reason,  since 
man  must  be  governed,  he  must  be  governed  by  something  higher 
and  more  excellent  than  man  himself,  if  the  government  is  to  be 
stable.  Since  now  nothing  more  excellent  can  be  found  in  this  world 
than  man  ....  who  is  yet  fallible,  and  has  much  in  common  with 
the  beasts,  ....  and  even  in  case  a  man  were  found  who  could 
he  moved  from  the  right  by  no  irregular  affections,  he  would  be  sub- 
ject to  mortality,  and  nt*  one  would  know  what  would  happen  with 
his  successors,  therefore  almighty  God,  out  of  special  grace  to  human 
kind,  has  ordained  the  means  of  the  common  written  "aw  [der  ordent- 
lichen  heschriehenen  Recht  und  Gesetze]  whereby  to  keep  the  temper 
of  magistrates  and  judges  in  the  right  way,  in  order  that  the  same 
may  govern  others  and  render  justice  without  any  hindrance  of  inor- 
dinate inclinations  and  affections,  and  when  one  considers  the  use- 
fulness of  such  a  divinely  given  means,  one  finds  that  this  ordination 
of  rights  and  laws  is  one  of  the  highest  benefits  and  gifts  with  which 
God  has  blessed  men  here  in  this  life,  for  such  laws  and  rights  were 
in  the  beginning  ordained  by  wise  honorable  people  after  necessary 
consideration,  not  from  friendship,  love  or  hate,  but  in  general  with- 
out all  inordinate  affections  and  inclinations When  now 

such  common  right  and  law  is  ordained,  even  if  those  who  act  con- 
trary to  it  are  punished  in  accordance  with  it,  ....  no  one  has 
occasion  for  complaint,  but  everyone  is  satisfied,  since  we  know  that 
justice  has  been  done  to  one  as  well  as  to  another,  and  that  so  impa- 
tience and  uproar  of  the  subjects  is  avoided.* 

A  little  later  (p.  37)  the  conclusion  is  drawn  still  more 
distinctly: 

»  The  uneasiness  of  Thomasius  over  the  traditional  doctrines  alxiut 
"beschriebeneGesetze*' {vide  Roscher,  in  re  Thomasius)  begins  to  show  itself 
in  the  note  in  this  passage,  viz.,  "the  written  laws  are  by  no  means  to 
be  preferred  to  the  customs"  {Cewoknheiten).  The  naive  reasoning 
which  Osse  represents  was  an  efifective  means  of  control  so  long  as  people 
accepted  it  at  face  value.  Revolution  was  certain  wherever  it  was  repu- 
diated without  substitution  of  a  constructive  theorv. 


98  THE  CAMERALISTS 

Hence  follows  that  it  is  a  human  duty  to  hold  the  common  rights 
and  laws  in  honor,  to  esteem  them  high,  and  to  subject  oneself  to 
them  with  patience,  as  the  means  whereby  common  peace,  repose 
and  welfare  are  maintained.  And  that  also  the  estabUshed  magis- 
tracy is  under  obligation  to  protect  such  right  and  law,  to  enforce 
it  and  to  govern  according  to  it,  not  oppressing  anyone  by  acting 
contrary  to  it.  For  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  as  the  powers  that 
be  are  ordained  of  God  (Ad.  Rom.  13)  likewise  also  human  rights 
and  laws  by  the  powers  that  be,  so  that  they  flow  from  the  providence 

and  special  destiny  of  almighty  God Accordingly  everyone 

should  remember  that  if  he  disobeys  the  magistrate  and  escapes 
punishment,  yet  he  is  not  assured  of  escaping  the  punishment  of 
almighty  God.' 

At  the  opening  of  the  second  part,  Osse  says  that,  in  order 
rightly  to  understand  his  reflections  as  a  whole,  it  is  necessary 
to  read  what  he  has  said  in  the  first  part  about  all  Christian 
governments.  As  to  electoral  Saxony  in  particular,  he  adds, 
it  has  been  the  object  of  special  divine  favor.  He  specifies 
as  a  fundamental  blessing,  that  the  government  is  not  elective 
but  hereditary,  and  exclusively  in  the  male  line."  The  con- 
sequence is  (p.  204)  that  the  best  people  in  the  country  are 
retained  in  the  service  of  the  court,  and  the  good  customs  and 
laws  continue  undisturbed.  The  country  has  therefore  grown 
in  power,  resources,  public  buildings,  and  otherwise.  Then 
follows  this  passage: 

And  since  every  government  in  temporal  affairs  is  of  two  partr 
[auf  zweyerley  stehet],  namely  government  (sic)  and  Policey,  and 
then  the  judiciary  and  justice,  it  is  in  order  that  the  aforenamed 

I  Entirely  aside  from  the  familiar  dogmatic  basis  of  this  argument, 
Osse's  use  of  the  terms  " beschriebene"  and  " geschriebene  Rechte" — 
apparently  without  variation  of  concept — plainly  shows  that  the  argu- 
ment got  some  of  its  plausibility  from  a  peculiar  form  of  the  ambiguous 
middle  hidden  in  the  logic,  i.  e.,  the  ecclesiastico-theological  associations 
of  the  terms  "heiiige  Schrift,"  ^' geschrieben,"  etc.,  were  carried  over 
to  all  written  laws. 

«  Thomasius  at  once  challenges  this  dictum,  on  the  ground  that 
debates  over  "the  best  form  of  government"  are  mere  pedantries. 


CIVICS  OF  OSSE  2Q 

land  in  this  respect  also  should  l)e  blessed  of  Go<l  before  many  other 
lands.  For,  in  the  first  place,  as  rcsiiccls  the  government,  ''hochcr- 
meldeter  ChurfUrst"  ordered  his  court  with  many  dignified  people, 
with  counts,  nobles,  doctors,  etc.,  who  hear  ihe  causes  presented, 
reflect  upon  these  matters,  weigh  and  consult,  and  with  timely  ad\  ice 
render  true  and  right  decisions.  ^^Scine  Cliurjiirsjl.  Gn.''  has  als») 
filled  the  civic  offices  with  functionaries,  with  orders  that  each  shall 
receive  what  is  due,  and  that  justice  shall  always  ho  rendered  to 
the  subjects.  For  in  this  country,  God  be  praised,  domestic  peace 
is  maintained,  and  many  wholesome  publications  appear  against 
oppression  and  irregular  administration.  Moreover,  in  this  land 
there  is  a  good  and  proper  coinage,  whereby  the  people  are  imjx'lled 
to  trade  with  one  another  in  all  the  things  which  they  need,  whereby 
the  revenues  of  the  prince  from  commerce  increase  [Zoll  und  Geleit], 

etc For  where  there  is  good  coinage  there  is  much  trade, 

and  where  is  much  trade  and  people  ....  the  land  in  general  ha.s 
improvement  and  prosperity,  etc. 

This  passage  may  be  used  as  a  way  mark.  In  the  German 
states  at  the  middle  of  the  sixteenth  century,  there  were  officials 
and  administration  enough,  but  measured  by  the  cameralism 
of  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century  the  officials  were  unor- 
ganized, and  the  administration  unspecialized  and  unsystem- 
atized. Men  of  Osse's  time  were  in  contact  with  rudiments 
of  all  the  governmental  activities  which  have  developed  since, 
but  these  were  relatively  inchoate  and  confused.  We  have 
distinctly  disclaimed  the  purpose  of  venturing  into  study  of 
the  evolution  of  cameralism,  either  theoretical  or  applied.  Our 
composite  picture  of  the  academic  side  of  it  merely  draws  in 
a  few  lines  from  this  embryonic  period. 

Osse  enumerates  as  another  blessing  of  the  country  the 
founding  of  "drey  Fiirsten-Schulen,  als  Meissen,  Pforten, 
Grimma,'  und  zwo  treffentliche  Universitiiten  und  hohc 
Schulen."'    The  author  refers  to  these  schools  as  particularly 

'  The  two  first  in  1543,  the  last  1550  (Thomasius). 
»  Leipzig,  i4oq.     Wittciilierg,  1502. 


3©  THE  CAMERALISTS 

to  prepare  men  for  ofl5cial  positions  and  to  give  them  training 
in  legal  knowledge.  Thomasius  comments  to  the  effect  that 
the  papacy  was  influential  enough  largely  to  nullify  the  benefits 
of  these  foundations.  Then  mention  is  made  of  the  two 
Hoffgerichte  held  by  the  elector,  the  one  at  Leipzig,  the  other 
at  Wittenberg,  and  the  Schdppen  are  also  praised  as  beneficent 
institutions,*  and  besides  the  other  higher  and  lower  courts 
held  by  prelates  and  nobles  on  their  estates,  there  are  many 
hundred  Land-Gerichte,  "so  that,  by  the  grace  of  God  a  praise- 
worthy justice  is  present  in  these  lands."  Moreover  the  coun- 
try possesses  a  specially  fine  Policey,'  and  all  affairs  are 
arranged  in  good  order,  and  we  meet  fine,  courteous,  afifable 
persons  in  all  stations.^  In  addition  many  natural  and  acquired 
advantages  are  enumerated  which  contribute  to  the  happiness 
of  the  country. 

■  Yet  in  spite  of  all  these  blessings,  the  author  finds  that 
it  is  possible  for  abuses  to  creep  in.  He  finds  this  danger  first 
in  the  administration  of  justice.  His  earliest  attention  is  given 
then  to  the  means  of  avoiding  these  evils.  The  caution  with 
which  he  approaches  the  subject  is  again  outspoken  in  prot- 
estations of  obedience  to  the  command  of  the  prince;  and  the 
author  refers  besides  to  the  demands  of  the  common  welfare 
{gemeinen  Nutz)  of  all  classes  in  the  country,  and  of  many 

I  These  courts  were  supposed  to  secure  justice  in  minor  cases  by 
a  fair  combination  of  official  and  lay  persons.  Thomasius  has  an  impor- 
tant note  (p.  210)  on  the  quarrels  in  the  law  faculties  over  Schdppen- 
stuhle.     Vide  pp.  208  and  310. 

'Thereupon  Thomasius  tartly  comments,  "I  will  not  undertake 
to  judge  what  sort  of  a  thing  a  fine  or  a  nasty  Policey  may  be."  We  shall 
not  go  into  Osse's  discussion  of  Policey  in  detail,  because  it  suits  our  pur- 
pose to  deal  with  the  maturer  form  of  the  system  particularly  as  reflected 
in  Justi.     Vide  below,  p.  436  et  passim. 

3  Americans  receive  no  more  elementary  impression  in  Germany 
than  that  the  concept  gute  Ordnung  fills  the  place  in  German  life-philoso- 
phy which  the  notion  "freedom"  occupies  in  ours. 


CIVICS  OF  OSSE  31 

surrounding  countries,  as  justifying  attempts  at  improvement, 
in  spite  of  the  opposition  of  those  whose  selfish  interests  are  on 
the  side  of  things  as  they  are. 

Osse  finds  the  root  of  all  the  difl&culties  which  he  has  in 
mind,  in  the  lack  of  properly  taught  and  trained  men  to  take 
the  places  of  responsibility  in  the  state.  This  fundamental 
opinion  accounts  for  the  extent  to  which  his  argument  turns 
upon  improvement  in  the  universities.  He  recurs  to  the  three 
reasons  which  he  had  assigned  in  sees.  XCIV-XCVI  of  Part  I, 
for  unsatisfactory  conditions  in  public  life,  viz.:  (a)  defective 
training  of  children,  (b)  omission  to  admit  young  men  to  the 
councils  of  their  elders,  (c)  frequent  changes  in  oflSce,  and  he 
adds  a  fourth,  viz.,  favoritism  to  relatives  and  friends.  This 
excludes  men  of  more  talent  from  public  careers,  or  from  the 
places  which  they  would  be  more  competent  to  fill.  The  first 
means  suggested  for  correcting  the  evil  is  a  system  of  secret 
representatives  of  the  prince  at  the  universities.  Their  duty 
should  be  to  pick  out  young  men  of  promise,  and  to  recommend 
them  for  appointments.  Thereupon  follow  all  the  propositions 
for  the  improvement  of  schools  and  universities.  With  respect 
to  the  latter,  Osse  restricts  himself  almost  exclusively  to  the 
"arme  betriibie  undfast  gefdlene  UniversiUU  Leipzig,^'  because 
he  professes  ignorance  of  the  facts  at  Wittenberg  (pp.  258  S.). 
As  a  source  of  information  about  conditions  within  and  around 
the  University  of  Leipzig  at  the  middle  of  the  sixteenth  century 
the  succeeding  chapters  are  highly  important.  In  this  con- 
nection Thomasius'  Appendix  of  264  pages  must  again  be 
mentioned.*  As  will  appear  however  when  the  systematic 
cameralists  are  before  us,  the  principal  questions  around  which 

'  Ein  Ueiner  Versuch  von  Annalibus  von  Anno  14OQ  bis  i62g.  Eine 
etwas  genauere  Einsicht  in  die  Historie  von  Ursprung  und  Fortgang 
der  Universitdten  in  Deutschland,  sonderlich  der  Universitdt  Leipzig  und 
Wittenberg,  und  denen  in  denenselben  entstandenen  Zdnchereyen  unter- 
schiedener  Facultdten  ingleichen  des  eingejilhrten  langweiligen  Processes, 
und  was  vermittelst  dieser  Zdnckereyen  vor  Unruhe  an  den  Chur-  und 


32  THE  CAMERALISTS 

cameralistic  theory  was  built  up  had  not  yet  risen  upon  Osse's 
horizon.  His  document  is  useful  for  our  purpose  merely  as 
a  picture  of  undifferentiated  confusion,  with  which  to  compare 
the  highly  articulated  system  of  two  centuries  later.  The 
Table  of  Contents  is  worth  consideration.  The  titles  of  chap- 
ters must  be  understood  to  stand  for  a  series  of  indictments 
of  everything  which  might  be  classed  under  those  heads  at 
Leipzig,  and  enough  evidence  appears  to  create  a  prima-facie 
case  in  favor  of  the  author's  substantial  correctness.  Here 
then  was  a  single  group  of  symptoms  which  impressed  men 
of  Osse's  type  as  calling  for  correction.  In  later  chapters 
the  reasons  will  appear  why  we  must  be  content  with  a  bare 
reference  to  this  earlier  type  of  social  theory. 

This  first  chapter  on  the  specific  subject  of  justice  (chap, 
xiv)  is  a  fine  and  typical  specimen  not  merely  of  Osse's  style, 
but  of  the  moral  valuations  which  were  current  among  the 
more  academic  thinkers.  The  contrast  between  the  objective 
facts  of  institutions  and  conduct  on  the  one  hand,  and  frequent 
and  almost  proverbial  formulations  of  abstract  moral  standards 
on  the  other,  is  perhaps  nowhere  more  evident  than  in  this 
period.  We  may  simply  record  in  passing  that  citations  might 
eaaly  be  made  from  the  literature  of  this  period,  which  would 
compare  favorably  in  moral  import  with  generalizations  of 
the  same  order  in  any  subsequent  generation.  The  essential 
demands  upon  justice,  as  presented  in  this  chapter,  are  that 
it  shall  be  (i)  unpartisan,  (2)  impersonal,  (3)  incorruptible.* 

To  this  particular  chapter  on  justice  Thomasius  adds  a 
long  note  (p.  435)  to  this  effect: 

Furstlichen  Sdchsischen  Hojen  verursacht  warden,  zu  erlangen,  zu  desto 
bessern  Ver stand  des  von  D.  Melchior  von  Osse  auj  ChurjUrst  Augusti 
AUergnddigslen  Bejehl  A.  1^55  verjertigten  und  I§j6  ubergebenen  Recht- 
lichen  Bedenckens.     Zum  Gebrauch  des  Thomasischen  Auditorii. 

»  The  first  half  at  least  is  a  rather  notable  apostrophe  to  Justice, 
and  the  remainder  shows  that  lofty  ideals  of  practical  application  were 
not  without  witnesses. 


CIVICS  OF  OSSE  33 

The  author  has,  to  be  sure,  said  much  that  is  good  and  useful 
about  justice.  He  has  however  forgotten  the  best  and  most  necessary, 
namely,  that  for  good  and  righteous  justice  it  is  necessary  that  the 
same  shall  be  administered  as  promptly  as  possible,  and  that  justice 
shall  not  be  tediously  suspended. 

In  fact,  Osse  expresses  himself  with  sufficient  clearness 
on  this  point  in  the  seventh  and  eighth  sections  of  the  same 
chapter. 

Then  follows  an  account  of  the  evils  actually  existing  in 
the  Saxon  courts,  and  suggestions  for  their  correction.  The 
same  general  scheme  is  followed  in  the  succeeding  chapters 
in  the  division  on  justice.  Distinguishing  the  chapter  on 
Policey  from  the  latter  for  purposes  of  emphasis,  and  because 
the  subject  occupies  such  a  unique  position  in  the  cameralistic 
period,  we  must  give  our  attention  to  the  editor,  although,  as 
we  have  intimated,  he  ought  not  properly  to  be  considered 
in  the  series  of  writers  with  whom  we  are  chiefly  concerned, 
and  although  the  chronological  order  is  disarranged  by  atten- 
tion to  him  here.  Osse  begins  the  chapter  on  Policey  with 
a  remark  to  this  effect:  Aristotle  and  the  greater  part  of  the 
ancient  wise  men  have  held  that  a  good  Policey  of  a  land  or 
a  city  requires  four  "pieces,"  viz.,  ^^Princeps,^'  ^^ Concilium,'' 
^'Praeiorium,'  and  ^^ Popidus.'"  These  the  author  translates, 
"a  ruler  or  overlord;  good  wise  counsel;  unpartisan,  good 
judicature,  and  a  pious  obedient  people."^  As  in  the  case  of 
an  earlier  reference  to  Policey,  Thomasius  at  once  takes  the 
cue,  and  his  note  is  an  important  symptom.  Beginning  with 
bibliographical  references  which  form  one  of  the  lines  of 
evidence  i)y  which  we  trace  the  influence  of  authors  to  be 
discussed  later,'  Thomasius  continues  (p.  500): 

'  "£/»  Regent  und  Ober-Herr;  guter  weiser  Rath;  unpartheyische 
gute  Gerichtharkeit,  und  ein  from  in  gehorsam  Volck." 

»  He  first  calls  to  mind  the  note  referred  to  above  (p.  30),  and  then 
rites:    "aus  dem  ersten  Theil  die  relation  und  judicium  von  Clapmarii 


34  THE  CAMERALISTS 

This  very  year  there  appeared  at  Franckfurth  am  Mayn  a  book 
entitled  Entwurff  einer  wohleingerichteten  Policey.  It  contains  seven 
sheets.  The  author,  who  does  not  give  his  name,  assumes  that  the 
flourishing  condition  of  the  financial  system  of  a  state  must  rest 
upon  four  chief  pillars,  namely  Policey,  fiscus,  commerce,  and  taxa- 
tion. The  Policey  has  to  do  with  the  internal  and  external  con- 
dition (Verfassung)  of  the  state.'  The  internal  condition  consists 
in  part  of  a  vigorous  society,  namely,  (i)  in  a  vigorous  growth  of 
the  inhabitants,  partly  in  a  joyous  life,  both  of  the  soul,  namely, 
(2)  in  a  religious  worship,  (3)  in  virtuous  conduct,  and  (4)  praise- 
worthy education;  and  of  the  body,  in  its  sustenance,  and  satisfac- 
tion, through  (5)  abundance  of  necessary,  useful,  and  superfluous 
means-of-life,  (6)  robust  health,  and  (7)  peaceful  security.  The 
external  condition  consists  (8)  in  the  good  order  of  people,  things, 
and  places,  and  (9)  in  a  convenient  ornamentation  of  city  and  coun- 
try. On  the  contrary,  every  state  is  disintegrated  and  disordered 
through  (i)  decline  of  population,  (2)  disregard  of  religion,  (3) 
vicious  life,  (4)  neglect  of  education,  (5)  lack  of  sustenance  and 
increase  of  the  pauper  class,  (6)  epidemics  and  plagues,  (7)  turbu- 
lence, revolts,  and  private  quarrels,  (8)  irregular  confusion  of  social 
strata,  affairs,  and  places,  (9)  uncultivated  lands  and  badly  ordered 
towns.  For  promotion  of  the  different  kinds  of  good  works,  and 
removal  of  the  evil,  the  author  proposes  in  general  the  establishment 

arcanis  rerumpublicarum,  von  Favist's  consiliis  pro  aerario,  von  Obrechts 
Politischen  Bedencken,  von  Klokii  de  Aerario,  von  der  Fiirstlichen  Macht- 
kunst  Oder  unerschdpflichen  Goldgrube,  von  des  Freyherrn  von  Schrotern 
FUrst.  Schatz  und  Rent-Camtner  {nolo  39,  p.  81;  noia  41,  pp.  96  ff.,  nota 
76,  pp.  152  ff.)  ingleichen  von  der  Einj&ltigkeii  der  Haushaltungs-Regeln 
{nota  40,  p.  95). 

»  One  of  the  anachronisms  in  English  interpretation  of  German 
thought  has  come  in  through  premature  translation  of  this  word  Ver- 
jassung  by  our  modern  term  "constitution."  Unless  direct  evidence 
to  the  contrary  appears  in.  rare  cases,  the  word  should  never  be  under- 
stood to  mean  "constitution"  in  the  modern  sense,  until  the  beginning 
of  the  struggle  for  constitutions.  I  believe  I  fairly  represent  what  the 
word  meant  to  the  author  cited  and  even  to  Thomasius  by  the  vague 
word  "condition."      The  remainder  of  the  quotation  supports  this  view. 


CIVICS  OF  OSSE  35 

of  a  Policey  bureau,  the  members  of  which  should  be  charged  with 
(i)  giving  their  earnest  attention  to  the  above  points,  (2)  averting 
harmful  occurrences,  (3)  controlling  disorder,  or  (4)  bringing  com- 
plaints before  the  proper  tribunals,  (5)  maintaining  reliable  watch- 
men and  detectives,  (6)  conducting  unexpected  visitations  and 
inquisitions,  (7)  keeping  a  watchful  eye  on  peaceful  persons,  things, 
and  places  in  the  state,  (8)  to  that  end  drawing  useful  ordinances 
relating  to  persons  and  things,  (9)  responsibility  for  observance  of 
the  same.  Thereupon  the  author  enlarges  upon  each  of  these  nine 
points  of  good  Policey,  especially  upon  the  population,  religion, 
virtuous  conduct,  good  kinds  of  education,  riches,  health,  security, 
order  and  adornment  of  a  state,  especially  upon  the  means  of  securing 
these  things,  and  of  avoiding  the  opposite.  Now  the  author  deserves 
praise,  in  the  first  place  [continues  Thomasius],  for  attempting  to 
treat  of  political  things  in  a  brief  and  very  well-connected  and  rather 
clear  didactic  fashion,  in  contrast  with  the  condition  of  which  I 
have  so  often  complained,  viz.,  that  there  has  been  scarcely  an  attempt 
in  universities  at  such  pedagogy  in  political  things.  Indeed  everyone 
who  reads  this  writing  will  find  in  it  much  whose  truth  he  will  com- 
prehend, and  the  introduction  or  abolition  of  which  he  will  agree 
with  the  author  in  finding  highly  desirable  for  the  state.  He  will 
accordingly  be  pleased  that  in  a  few  hours'  reading  he  has  learned 
from  the  author  more  well-connected  truths  than  if  he  had  spent 
two  years  with  political  works  written  according  to  the  Aristotelian 
method 

Thomasius  then  refers  to  a  second  monograph  of  the  same 
author,  another  tract  also  published  by  him  this  year,  viz., 
Politische  Gedanken,  welcher  gestalt  Monarchen  und  Konige, 
Republiquen  und  Fursten,  nebst  ihren  Reichen,  Ldndern  und 
Unterthanen,  durch  eine  leichte  methode  mdchtig  und  reich 
seyn  oder  werden  konnen;  and  he  continues : 

In  this  connection  much  remains  to  be  said  in  order  to  make 
such  a  tract  complete.  I  will  attempt,  however,  to  mention  only 
the  principal  things,  as  suggested  by  this  brief  introduction,  (i)  It 
is  to  be  wished  that  the  author  had  explained  somewhat  more  clearly 
how  the  Policey  system  should  be  distinguished  from  the  fiscal, 


36  THE  CAMERALISTS 

commercial  and  taxing  systems.  He  observes  at  the  outset,  to  be 
sure,  that  the  fiscal  system  should  deal  with  the  Oeconomie^  of  the 
country  and  the  domains  of  sovereigns;  the  commercial  systems 
with  trade  and  business  [Handel  und  Wandel],  with  the  appertaining 
occupations  and  professions;  the  taxing  system  with  the  arrange- 
ments for  contribution  to  the  state,  and  he  promises  to  expand  his 
thoughts  upon  these  three  neighboring  pillars.  After  he  thereupon 
announces,  however,  that  the  Policey  has  charge  of  the  internal  and 
external  condition  [Verfassung]  of  a  state,  one  is  not  without  reason 
for  the  opinion  that,  because  the  fiscal,  commercial  and  taxing 
systems  also  belong  to  the  internal  or  external  condition  of  the  state, 
these  three  pieces  must  also  be  counted  as  parts  of  the  Policey  system. 
And  if  one  should  say  that  the  Policey  system  is  here  understood 
in  a  restricted  sense,  namely,  so  far  as  the  same  takes  account  of 
the  well-being  [Wohiseyn]  of  the  subjects,  since  on  the  other  hand 
the  fiscal  and  taxing  systems  aim  at  the  well-being  of  the  rulers,  this 
difference  might  have  been  announced  at  once  without  circumlocution 
by  the  author,  but  on  the  other  hand  it  would  then  not  be  clear  how 
the  commercial  system  is  distinguished  from  the  Policey  system, 
especially  as  everyone  understands  that  the  same  belongs  to  the  fifth 
chapter,  and  the  author  also  there  recommends  the  commercial 
system  as  a  necessary  part  of  the  same.  (2)  It  is  very  serious 
that  the  author  regards  all  these  four  pillars  not  as  the  ground 
of  a  peaceful  and  virtuously  reasonable  state,  but  as  a  ground 
of  the  increasingly  prosperous  fiscal  system,  and  that  at  the  beginning 
of  the  second  tract  he  lays  down  this  rule  as  a  basis:  "All  considerable 
rulers  must  attend  to  their  sole  ultimate  purpose  [eintzigen  Endzweck] 
and  highest  interest,  viz.,  to  become  powerful  and  (supplying  from 
the  title  the  words  carefully  omitted  in  this  passage)  rich."'  For 
although  in  the  present  tract  he  chatters  about  religion  and  virtue, 

'  The  reasons  for  not  translating  this  term  will  appear  later.  Vide 
Index,  title  "Eiconomy  and  Related  Terms." 

»  A  part  of  the  reason  for  introducing  Osse  at  all  in  this  book  is  the 
value  of  these  editorial  notes  upon  his  monograph  in  throwing  light  on 
contemporary  estimates  of  the  cameral  system.  Thomasius  here  puts 
his  finger  upon  the  central  trait  of  cameralism,  and  it  is  astonishing  that 
later  writers  have  so  far  lost  account  of  this  clue  to  the  whole  theory. 


CIVICS  OF  OSSE  37 

it  is  on  the  other  hand  very  suspicious  when,  at  the  beginning  of  the 
second  chapter  (p.  i8),  he  announces  that  he  will  not  inquire  whether 
religion  is  an  invention  of  the  clergy  and  statesmen,  who  introduced 
it  for  spiritual  or  secular  purposes,  but  it  will  be  enough  that  the 
same  furnished  the  chief  foundation  of  a  state.  In  the  same  spirit 
(on  p.  5),  in  reciting  the  satisfactions  of  the  body  he  places  riches 
first,  and  gives  precedence  to  the  same  not  only  over  health  but  also 
over  peaceful  security.  Indeed,  in  chapter  i,  §6,  p.  9,  he  recom- 
mends polygamy  as  a  serviceable  means  of  increasing  the  population. 
Again  he  refers  to  regulation  and  limitation  only  of  houses  of  prosti- 
tution, where  they  are  to  be  tolerated  for  reasons  of  state,  etc.,  etc. 
Who  the  author  is,  I  will  not  disclose,  although  I  discovered  his 
identity  a  short  time  after  I  had  read  his  two  tracts  and  had  made 
these  notes.  Meanwhile  he  has  sufficiently  betrayed  himself  when, 
in  the  tract,  How  Great  Lords  May  Become  Rich  (p.  11),  he  cites  a 
Discurs  published  by  his  father  in  1655 

It  is  evident  that  after  writing  note  105  above  referred  to 
(p.  30)  Thomasius  saw  a  great  light,  partly  through  the  eyes 
of  this  unnamed  writer,  on  the  place  of  Policey  in  the  adminis- 
trative system.  So  much  of  the  note  is  quoted,  however,  not 
primarily  for  its  connection  with  Thomasius,  but  because  the 
resumi  of  the  document  will  be  useful  for  comparison  later. 
At  the  same  time  a  few  sentences  should  be  added  from  the 
paragraph  in  Osse  to  which  Thomasius'  note  is  appended.^ 
They  continue  his  reference  to  the  different  divisions  of  admin- 
istration.    Gsse  says: 

Everything  should  be  directed  toward  keeping  these  four  parts 
in  good  condition,  if  one  is  to  maintain  a  good  Policey,  for  a  lord  and 
ruler  is  in  three  respects  under  obligations  to  the  people  divinely 
intrusted  to  him;  namely,  that  he  should  maintain  the  same  in  good 
prosperous  circumstances,  which  occurs  when  the  people  [das  Volck] 
lives  virtuously,  and  some  among  them  are  promoted  to  learning, 
and  to  good  arts,  and  many  wise  and  learned  people  are  in  their 
number,  from  whom  the  rest  may  receive  good  instruction,  and  they 

»  Vide  above,  p.  33. 


38  THE  CAMERALISTS 

are  not  left  to  wander  in  the  darkness  of  ignorance,  and  everything 
through  which  such  promotion  of  things  useful  to  the  community 
is  hindered  is  either  prevented  or  averted  by  the  ruler. 

The  foregoing  is  of  firstrate  importance  when  we  generalize 
the  civic  assumptions  of  the  cameralists. 

It  is  to  be  noted  that  Osse  could  say,  "Praise  God,  this 
land  is  already  provided  with  an  honorable,  good,  and  praise- 
worthy Policey"  (p.  506).*  He  could  offer  only  certain  very 
cautious  and  vague  suggestions  about  details.  For  instance, 
he  calls  attention  to  conflicts  of  interests  between  rural  and  urban 
populations,  which  tended  to  injustice  toward  the  former, 
through  the  tendency  to  concentrate  certain  rural  occupations, 
such  as  brewing,  in  the  towns  (p.  509).  Thomasius  comments 
on  the  justice  of  his  position,  in  spite  of  the  foolishness  of  the 
grounds  on  which  it  is  based,  viz.,  that  in  Roman  law  trade  was 
prohibited  to  the  nobility.  Again,  Osse  denounces  the  inhu- 
manity of  many  of  the  nobility  toward  the  widows  and  orphans 
of  their  dependents,  and  calls  upon  the  elector  to  appoint  a 
supervisor  to  act  as  a  guardian  of  such  dependent  persons,  and 
to  secure  their  rights  against  conscienceless  nobles.  In  the 
third  place,  he  urges  upon  the  elector  correction  of  practice  in 
the  criminal  courts,  and  especially  prevention  of  illegal  resort 
to  torture.  Increase  of  the  amount  of  light  and  air  in  prisons; 
certain  sumptuary  reforms,  on  the  ultimate  ground  (p.  516) 
that  luxury  drains  money  from  the  country;  attempts  to  pre- 
vent rise  in  the  price  of  meat;  appointment  of  trustees  to  keep 
heirs  from  squandering  their  estates,  are  substantially  all  the 
further  changes  which  Osse  was  able  to  recommend. 

The  Testament  proper  closes  with  these  considerations. 
An  appendix  of  seventeen  pages,  including  the  editor's  notes, 
is  added,  with  the  title,  Additio  Gemeine  des  Heil.  Reichs 

I  As  evidence  that  this  part  of  the  administration  was  well  guarded, 
he  cites  the  Policey-  und  Landes-Ordnung,  published  by  Elector  August 
in  1555,  "in  Cor  pore  Juris  Saxonici,  torn.  I,  pp.  31  biss  59  zu  lesen." 


CIVICS  OF  OSSE  39 

Wohlfarth  belangende.  It  replies  to  the  hypothetical  question, 
Supposing  the  conduct  advised  in  the  Testament  were  strictly 
adopted  in  Saxony,  would  it  not  all  be  in  vain,  because  of  the 
disorder  in  the  Holy  Roman  Empire  at  large  ?  The  unhappy 
condition  of  the  Empire  was  attributed  by  Osse  to  three  causes : 
(i)  the  religious  quarrels,  (2)  the  weakening  of  the  judicial 
authority  of  the  Empire,  (3)  disregard  of  Landfrieden  within 
the  Empire.  In  discussing  the  situation  he  puts  the  emphasis 
almost  entirely  on  the  first  point.  The  whole  matter  is  pri- 
marily political  in  another  sense  from  that  in  which  the  came- 
ralists  are  to  be  considered,  and  it  is  not  therefore  material  to 
our  inquiry.^ 

Although  Thomasius'  Versiich  von  Annalibus  is  not  directly 
germane  to  our  purpose,  its  presence  in  the  same  volume  with 
the  Testament  is  excuse  for  alluding  to  it  again.  It  is  profess- 
edly an  attempt  to  stimulate  the  neglected  study  of  history. 
It  is  a  collection  of  data  principally  concerning  education 
in  Saxony.  It  covers  the  period  1 409-1 629.  To  the  student 
of  Saxon  history,  and  especially  of  the  University  of  Leipzig, 
it  would  be  an  extremely  valuable  secondary  source. 

»  Thomasius  insists  (p.  532)  that  Osse's  omission  to  mention  in  this 
connection  the  Religious  Peace  of  Augsburg  (September  25,  1555) 
strengthens  the  suspicion  that  he  was  not  a  good  Lutheran,  but  at  heart 
a  papist.  As  the  Testament  was  dated  December,  1555,  and  as  the 
Additio  was  written  later,  failure  to  mention  it,  the  editor  thinks,  points 
to  the  author's  lack  of  sympathy  with  any  arrangement  in  the  nature 
of  a  modus  vivendi  between  the  contending  forces.  Osse's  own  profes- 
sions do  not  tend  to  confirm  this  hypothesis. 


CHAPTER  III 
THE  CIVICS  OF  OBRECHT 

The  only  writer  whom  it  is  necessary  to  mention  between 
Ossc  and  Obrecht  is  Georg  Engelhard  von  Lohneyss  (some- 
times written  Lohneis,  Lohneissen,  etc.).  Although  his  name 
frequently  occurs  in  the  cameralistic  books,  there  is  no  reason 
to  regard  him  as  an  important  contributor  to  cameralistic 
science.  Thomasius  {Vorrede  zum  Testatnent,  p.  25)  intimates 
that  Lohneyss  borrowed  much  without  credit  from  Osse.  I 
have  been  unable  to  obtain  any  of  his  writings.  Inama  says 
of  him :  * 

He  was  of  an  aristocratic  Palatine  family.  He  was  first  Master 
of  the  Horse  at  the  court  of  Elector  August  of  Saxony.  In  1583  he 
entered  the  service  of  Heinrich  Julius  of  Braunschweig-Wolfen- 
biitiel,  first  as  Stallmcister,  then  as  Berghauptmann.  At  both  courts 
he  had  rare  opportunities  for  training  in  the  practical  administrative 
technique  of  the  time.  Each  court  was  supposed  to  have  a  model 
administrative  system.  August  was  an  eminent  and  tireless  admin- 
istrator, Heinrich  Julius  the  best  trained  jurist  among  contemporary 
rulers.  At  the  same  time  these  courts  were  noted  for  their  display. 
From  his  purchased  estates  Lohneyss  bore  the  title  "Erbherr  in 
Remlingen  und  Xeundorf."  For  a  while  he  had  his  own  printing 
establishment,  particularly  to  secure  proper  publication  of  his  own 
writings.  His  three  chief  works  were  printed  here.'  The  latter 
part  of  his  life  is  without  traces  in  the  confusion  of  the  Thirty  Years' 
War.     His  printing  establishment  and  the  stock  of  his  books  were 

'  All.  d.  Bib.,  in  loc. 

»  Viz.,  (\)  Delia  Cavelleria.  S.  de  arte  equitando,  exercitiis  equestribus 
el  lorneamenlis,  s^riindlicher  Berichl  von  allem  was  zu  der  lohlichen  Reiterei 
gehori^,  und  einem  Cavalier  zu  wissen  von  Nothen,  auch  Chur  und  War- 
lung  der  Pjerde  und  wie  man  dieselhen  auj  allerhand  Manier  ahrichUn 
und  zdumen  soil,  1609,  2fJ  cd.,  1624;  (2)  Bericht  vom  Bergwerh,  wie 
mandieselben  bauen  und  in  guten  Wohlstand  bringen  soil,  1617;  (3)  Aulico- 

40 


CIVICS  OF  OBRECHT  41 

destroyed  in  the  course  of  that  "struggle.  SeckendorfiF,  in  his  Vorrede, 
praised  the  Hof-Staat-  und  Regierungskunsi;  yet  like  the  rest  of 
the  author's  writings  it  has  no  special  scientific  weight.  Still  his 
chief  cameralistic  work  stands,  in  riches  of  content  and  enlightened 
judgment,  as  well  as  practical  insight,  far  above  the  mass  of  theoreti- 
cal political  products,  and  forms  an  immediate  preparation  for  the 
flourishing  period  of  German  cameralistics  inaugurated  by  Secken- 
dorflF's  Tetttscher  Fiirstenstaat. 

The  biography  of  Georg  Obrecht  is  best  epitomized  in 
Eisenhart's  sketch:^ 

Obrecht  was  bom  in  Strassburg  in  1547,  and  died  in  the  same 
city  in  1612.  As  a  young  man  he  studied  in  Paris.  After  escaping 
the  massacre  of  St.  Bartholomew,  which  cost  the  loss  of  his  library, 
he  went  to  Basel  and  obtained  there  the  degree  of  Doctor  of  Laws 
in  1574.  In  1575  he  was  made  Professor  of  Law  in  Strassburg, 
and  he  retained  the  position  to  the  end  of  his  life.  As  the  fleeting 
glory  of  Wittenberg  began  to  fade,  Strassburg  assumed  the  spiritual 
leadership  of  Protestant  Germany.  Along  with  Giffen  and  Gotho- 
fredus,  it  was  chiefly  Obrecht  who  founded  the  fame  of  the  Strassburg 
academy.  He  held  various  offices  and  dignities  besides  his  professor- 
ship. In  1604  he  w^  made  a  noble  of  the  empire,  and  in  1609  he 
received  the  title  of  Palgrave. 

For  the  purposes  of  this  book  Obrecht  is  important  as  the 
author  of  a  single  volume.'    The  chief  significance  of  the  five 

politica  oder  Hoj-Staats-  und  Regierungskunst,  1622-24,  republished 
1679.  Apparently  the  last  was  identical  with  the  book  often  referred 
to  under  the  title  Teutscher  Regentenstaat  (vide  Roscher,  p.  116).  There 
are  good  reasons  for  the  suspicion  that  Lohneyss  has  been  mentioned  by 
many  writers  who  neglected  to  state  that  their  knowledge  of  him  was  at 
second  hand. 

»  All.  d.  Bib.,  in  loc. 

*  Fiinff  underschiedliche  Secreta  Politica,  von  A  nstellung,  Erhaltung 
und  Vermehrung  guter  Policey,  und  von  billicher,  rechtmdssiger  und 
nothwendiger,  Erhohung  eines  jeden  Regenten  Jdhrlichen  Gejallen  und 
Einkommen.  Allen  Hohen  und  Nidern  Ohrigkeiten,  besonders  dess 
Heiligen  Romischen  Reichs  Stdnden,  in  diesen  letzten  und  hochbetrangten 


42  THE  CAMERALISTS 

monographs  which  make  up  the  volume  is  disclosed  at  once 
in  the  Preface  by  the  author's  son,  Joannes  Thomas  Obrecht 
("J.  C.  et  Comes  Palatinus  Caesareus").  As  editor  he  gives 
an  account  of  the  origin  and  purpose  of  the  different  mono- 
graphs. Attention  is  piqued  at  once  by  the  statement,  "I 
printed  the  bo{^  at  my  own  expense,  and  secretly."*  Accord- 
ing to  the  editor's  explanation,  the  essays  are  the  outgrowth 
and  development  of  a  central  purpose,  which  is  stated  in  con- 
nection with  the  account  of  the  first  document.  In  a  word, 
the  wars  with  the  Turks  had  made  the  question  of  money  to 
pay  expenses  importunate.  In  the  year  1590  Obrecht  Sr. 
had  publicly  discussed  certain  theses  de  principijs  belli.  In 
that  discussion  he  had  maintained,  among  other  things,  that 
in  order  to  carry  on  successful  war,  and  to  defend  their  lands, 
governments  {Obrigkeilen)  must  be  provided  with  an  abun- 
dance of  money  {mit  einem  starcken  Gelt  Neroo).  He  had  also 
announced  that  he  would  be  ready,  on  a  more  favorable  occa- 
sion, to  go  into  detail  as  to  the  ways  in  which  this  Nervus  belli 
might  be  obtained  "through  Christian,  righteous,  and  proper 
means." 

A  single  remark  of  a  relatively  obscure  writer  would  be 
of  little  weight  in  supporting  a  general  hypothesis.  If  there 
were  any  doubt  that  this  problem  of  ways  and  means  for  the 
maintenance  of  military  operations  was  desperate  in  every 
German  state,  it  would  be  necessary  to  set  down  this  item  for 
what  it  is  worth,  and  to  go  into  the  political  records  of  Germany 
for  evidence  of  the  fiscal  conditions.     This  has  been  done  so 

Zeiten  turn  besten.  Hiebevor  gesUUet  durch  Ceorgium  Obrechtum,  J.  C. 
Sacri  Palalij  Comitem,  Ret  pub.  Argentinens.  Advocatum,  d^  Academiae 
AnUcessorem.  Hernacher  im  Jahr  1617  zum  Truck  befordert,  und  biss 
anhero  ingeheitn  gehalten:  Nunmehr  aber  zu  mdnnigliches  Nutzen  publi- 
cirt,  und  mit  nothwendigen  Registern  verbessert.  "Lectio  lecta  placet, 
decies  repetita  placebil"  (351  pp.  with  indexes). 

'  "Auf  mcincn  Costen,  in  gcheim  und  sub  secreto,"  Vorrede,  p.  1. 


CIVICS  OF  OBRECHT  43 

fully,  however,  by  German  historians  that  no  question  remains 
about  the  main  facts.  Our  problem  is  to  interpret  the  phe- 
nomena of  cameralism  as  one  of  the  outgrowths  of  the  times 
in  which  these  facts  existed.  Here  then  was  a  single  theorist. 
He  confronted  a  situation  which  vexed  all  types  of  men  theoret- 
ically or  practically  concerned  with  questions  of  civic  polity 
in  Germany.  The  key  to  the  situation,  as  he  saw  it,  was  the 
need  of  more  money  to  strengthen  the  state  for  war,  in  particu- 
lar, as  well  as  for  other  purposes.  With  this  as  his  clue,  he 
reasoned  to  the  best  of  his  ability,  and  the  result  was  a  scheme, 
on  paper,  which  may  fairly  be  called  a  respectable  first  draft 
of  a  programme  which  was  later  worked  out  in  detail,  and 
quite  in  the  same  spirit,  by  the  cameralists.  Without  pre- 
judging the  theories  of  later  writers,  and  without  generalizing 
at  this  point  about  the  extent  to  which  the  object  of  subsequent 
thinkers  was  identical  with  that  of  Obrecht,  we  must  define 
his  purpose  clearly,  and  make  it  the  explanation  of  his  pro- 
posals. In  a  word,  he  wanted  to  show  how  civic  authorities 
might  solve  their  most  importunate  problem  of  command- 
ing the  sinews  of  war,  and  of  providing  for  the  more  ordinary 
expenses  of  government.  His  whole  discussion  centers  about 
this  theme. 

The  son  does  not  tell  why  it  was  thought  necessary  to  keej) 
the  monographs  secret.  Apparently  the  essential  reason  was 
that  such  subjects  were  thought  to  be  matters  for  the  rulers 
and  the  learned  alone,  and  that  either  the  monogra[)hs  them- 
selves were  not  sufficiently  matured  for  publication,  or  that  no 
public  existed,  outside  of  a  select  circle,  intelligent  or  respon- 
sible enough  to  profit  by  reading  them.  So  far  as  evidence 
appears  in  the  volume  itself,  Obrecht's  theories  contained 
nothing  calculated  to  arouse  governmental  hostility.  At  the 
worst  they  might  be  regarded  as  well  intended  but  visionary. 

On  the  contrary,  as  the  editor  further  states,  Rudolf  II 
called  for  Obrc(  ht's  opinion  on  the  fiscal  problem,  and  he 


44  THE  CAMERALISTS 

accordingly  \\Tote  the  first  monograph.  This  document  con- 
tains 59  pages,  \\'ith  an  index  of  6  pages,  and  is  chiefly  in  Latin.' 

It  is  not  clear  whether  the  editor  means  to  imply  that  his 
father's  further  opinion  was  demanded  from  high  quarters, 
or  whether  the  above  occasion  spurred  him  to  further  study. 
At  all  events  the  account  continues  to  the  effect  that  Obrecht 
diligently  searched  the  Politicorum  scripta,  so  far  as  they  were 
available,  and  tested  them  by  the  Word  of  God,  in  order  to 
learn  which  doctrines  were  to  be  rejected,  and  which,  as  pre- 
cious pearl  and  gems,  should  be  loyally  retained,  and  by 
the  grace  of  God  so  set  forth  and  applied  that  no  one  could 
have  a  grievance  against  them.  The  outcome  of  this  study 
was  the  second  monograph.' 

Of  this  Bedencken  the  editor  affirms  that  it  was  calculated 
to  inspire  confidence,  both  in  rulers  and  subjects,  on  the  one 
hand  that  the  proposed  means  would  be  sufficient,  and  on 
the  other  hand  that  the  demands  of  the  government  would  not 
be  unreasonable. 

Obrecht,  however,  did  not  fully  trust  his  own  judgment 
about  such  important  matters.      He  did  not  venture  to  call  the 

'  Its  special  title  reads:  Georgii  Obrechti,  etc.  Discursus  Bellico- 
polilicus.  Invictissimo  et  A ugustissimo  Principi  ac  Domino,  Dn.  Rudolpho 
Laudatissintae  Memoriae.  II  Romanorum  Imperatori,  Anno  M.  DC. 
I V.  ab  A  ulhore  humilima.  animi  devotione  oblatus,  in  quo  quomodo  advur- 
sus  Turcicum  Tyrannum  helium  commode  geri  possit,  quam  jelicissime 
ostenditur. 

2  Beginning  with  the  initials  of  the  ascription,  "Auspice  Deo  Triune 
Optimo  Maximo,"  the  title-page  reads:  "  Politisch  Bedencken  und  Dis- 
curs:  Von  Verbesserung  Land  unnd  Lent,  Anrichiung  guier  Policey.  Und 
jiirnemblich  von  nutzlicher  Erledigung  grosser  Aussgaben,  und  billicher 
Vermehrung  eines  jeden  Regenlen  und  Oberherren  Jdhrlichen  Cejdllen 
und  Einhommen."  This  monograph  occupies  135  pages,  without  index. 
Its  main  propcjsitions  are  in  German,  and  they  are  fortified  by  copious 
quotations  in  I^tin  from  the  Politicorum  scripta,  the  same  ranging  from 
legendary  sayings  of  Servius  TuUius,  to  dicta  of  contemporary  authorities 
in  canonical  and  civil  law. 


CIVICS  OF  OBRECHT  45 

proposal  complete  until  he  had  consulted,  either  in  person  or 
in  correspondence,  during  several  years,  "under  pledge  of 
silence,"  eminent  theologians,  "and  highly  experienced  states- 
men." With  this  assistance  the  Discurs  was  finished  in  1609.' 
The  third  document  in  the  series  is  in  form  an  independent 
monograph,  but  the  editor  says  it  was  drawn  from  the  Bedencken 
and  was  intended  to  show  more  plainly  how  the  ideas  in  the 
former  treatise  could  be  applied.  It  was  finished  in  1610. 
It  contains  46  pages.  * 

'  There  is  a  discrepancy  of  no  material  importance  for  our  purpose,  be- 
tween the  younger  Obrecht  and  Thomasius  with  reference  to  this  mono- 
graph. The  latter  states  (Osse,  p.  87)  that  the  Politisches  Bedencken  was 
printed  at  Strassburg  in  the  year  1606;  that  is,  three  years  earlier  than  it 
was  completed,  if  the  former  is  correct.  Thomasius  adds  that  a  copy  of 
this  first  edition  was  in  his  possession.  This  appears  to  make  him  a  com- 
petent witness  so  far,  especially  as  he  quotes  enough  of  the  remainder  of 
the  title  to  make  the  identity  of  the  monograph  rather  certain.  From 
the  context,  however,  it  is  plain  that  Thomasius  had  never  seen  the  edition 
of  161 7,  in  which  the  document  in  question  was  virtually  the  second 
chapter.     Of  that  edition  he  says,  upon  the  authority  of  Deckher,  "descrip- 

/i5/1</m/>o/i5,  p.m.  335 Theother,  presumably  somewhat  enlarged, 

appeared  in  the  year  161 7."  He  further  states  that  copies  of  the  latter 
edition,  at  some  date  which  he  does  not  mention,  sold  for  one  hundred 
Gulden.  To  account  for  this  he  quotes  that  writer  as  follows:  "Testata 
est  Republ.  Argentinensis,  adferendo  omnis  exemplaria  suae  Cancellariae 
nolle  se  consilia  civis  fui,  quae  illi  in  proxi  pessime  cessere,  omnibus  palam 
fieri."  Thomasius  concludes  that  this  "confiscation"  was  the  reason 
for  the  scarcity  price.  The  inference  is  plausible  enough,  but  the  only 
reason  that  can  be  surmised  for  calling  in  the  book  is  similar  to  parents' 
motives  for  keeping  some  books  which  they  find  profitable  for  themselves 
out  of  reach  of  their  children. 

A  little  later  in  the  Preface,  the  editor  says  of  the  third  document 
in  the  volume,  the  Aerarium  Sanctum,  "so  biss  daio  niemanden  communi- 
ciret  worden."  The  date  referred  t<j  must  mean  that  on  which  the  collec- 
tion was  published,  161 7. 

»  The  title  and  general  outline  indicate  its  scope,  viz.,  Constitutio 
von  nothwendiger  und  niitzlicher  Anstellung  eines  Aerarij  Sancti.  Durch 
welches  jUrnemblich  die  Beforderung  und  Erhaltung  gemeiner  Wohljahrt 


46  THE  CAMERALISTS 

Having  gone  sd  far  in  his  studies,  Obrecht  discovered 
that  something  more  was  necessary.  He  concluded  that  the 
entire  life  of  sovereigns  and  subjects  must  be  conducted  in 
accordance  with  the  dictates  of  thrift  and  morality,  or  the  means 
•woidd  still  be  lacking  to  provide  the  necessary  revenues.  Accord- 
ingly he  harked  back  to  Roman  exploitation  of  "Censum  et 
Censuram"  and  he  elaborated  a  scheme  of  Policey,  partly 
prompted  by  his  conception  of  the  Roman  system,  partly 
appropriating  contemporary  police  arrangements,  and  partly 
a  speculative  proposal.  The  significant  point  is  that  the  animus 
of  the  whole  undertaking  was  the  proposal  to  devise  means 
by  which  adequate  revenues  might  be  assured  to  the  state.  At 
the  same  time,  and  this  is  a  trait  that  runs  through  the  whole 
cameralistic  regime,  the  total  morale  of  the  people  was  to  be 
improved,  primarily  to  be  sure  for  state  purposes,  but  none  the 
less  improvement  of  the  physical,  mental,  and  moral  life  con- 
ditions of  all  the  people  was  an  avowed  and  prominent  part 

gesucht  und  erlangt  wird;  Beschrieben  und  angeslelU  von  Ceorgio  Obrechlo, 
etc. 

I.  Ein  sondere  Constitutio  und  Ordnung,  dc  ludiciario  Vectigali. 

II.  Von  sechs  Ordnungen,  in  welchen  die  bona  Fisci,  dcm  Aerario 
Sando  zugeeignet  werden:  i.  Ordinatio,  von  oedcn  und  uncrljawlen 
Giilcren;  2.  Ordinatio,  de  Bonis  Vacanlibus:  3.  Ordinatio  de  Bonis 
perJilis,  &•  proderelicto  habitis,  item  de  Ixjnis  percgrinorum,  cr*  Thesauris; 
4.  Ordinatio,  dc  Bonis  Ereptitiis;  5.  Orrlinatio,  de  Bonis  Datnnatorum 
it  Proicriptorum;  6.  Ordinatio,  de  Bonis  incest  as  Nuptias  conlrahenlium; 

III.  Von  vier  Ordnungen,  durch  wclchc  ratione  bonorum  suhdilorvm 
das  Aerarium  Sanctum  mit  vielen  starckcn  Jiihrlichen  Gefallen,  und 
Einkommcn  versehen  wird:  7.  Ordinatio,  de  Bonis  subditorum  in  tUtima 
aliqua  voluntate  Aerario  Sancto  reliclis;  8.  Ordinatio,  de  Bonis  Subditorum, 
qui  in  ultima  aliqua  voluntate,  extraneis  personis  aliquid  reliqucrunt: 
9.  Ordinatio,  de  Bonis  subditorum,  qui  line  herede  lineae  ascendentis  &• 
descendentis  decedunt,  &"  in  Linea  coUaterali  tantum  ultra  seplimum 
gradum  heredes  post  se  rdinquunt:  10.  Ordinatio,  von  ciner  nothwen- 
digen,  und  hochnutzlichen  Fewr-Ordnung. 

IV.  De  Fine  huius  Constitutionis,  und  wahin  obcrklilrlc  reditus 
kdnnen,  und  soUen  verwendet  werden. 


CIVICS  OF  OBRECHT  47 

of  the  programme.  It  was  not  stated  by  the  cameralists  (Justi 
possibly  excepted)  as  an  end-end.  It  was  emphasized  with 
cumulative  insistence  as  a  means-end,  and  this  factor  became 
one  of  the  distinguishing  elements  in  German  polity.^  The 
fifth  and  last  document  or  ^^secretum"  in  the  series  is  referred 
to  as  the  Aerarium  Liherorum.  Ostensibly  it  was  a  plan  of 
savings  and  endowment  insurance  for  children.  The  author 
avows  quite  frankly,  however,  that  in  essence  it  is  a  detail  in 
his  fiscal  scheme.  In  a  word,  parents  were  to  lay  by,  in  the 
hands  of  the  government,  certain  regular  amounts,  to  receive 
interest  at  6  per  cent.,  and  to  be  paid  to  the  children  named 

'  The  so-called  "Constitution,'"  in  which  this  scheme  of  Policey  is 
outlined,  contains  only  31  pages.     Its  title-page  is  as  follows: 

Ein  sondere  Policey -Or  dnung,  und  Constitution,  durch  welche  ein 
jeder  Magistratus,  vermittels  besonderen  angestellten  Deputaten,  jederzeit 
in  seiner  Regierung,  eine  gewisse  Nachrichtung  haben  mag,  I.  Wie  es 
gleichsam  mil  seiner  ganzen  Policey,  als  eines  Politischen  Leibs,  und  alien 
desselberen  Gliederen,  den  Underthanen  beschaffen.  II.  Wie  gemelter 
Policey,  derselben  Gliederen,  und  Administration,  auff:  und  zunemmen 
zubejiirderen,  ab:  und  undergang  zuverhiiten.  So  dann  zum  III.  Wie 
auch  die  gemeine  Woljarth,  so  aitss  vorgedachten  dreyen  StUcken  herkompt, 
zuvermehren,  und  zu  crhalten  seyen,  Allen  Oberbeiten,  in  diesen  letzten, 
verhehrten,  und  gejdhrlichen  Zeiten,  hochnotwendig,  und  in  viel  Weg 
nutzlich  samt  einer  kurtzen  Information,  und  Erhlilrung,  auch  einem 
A  ppendice. 

The  "Information"  and  " Erkldrung,"  together  with  the  Appendix, 
occupy  32  pages.  The  inscription  of  the  former  reads:  "Kurtze  Infor- 
mation und  Erklurung.  In  welchen  die  Precia  Inscriptionum  bestimbt, 
und  die  Nutzbarkeiten  welchc  auss  den  inscriptionibus,  inscriptionum 
Document  is  6*  A  Ibis,  wie  auch  aus  Anordnung  der  Deputaten,  st^wol 
privatim,  als  publice  zuerlangen  seind,  kiirtzlich  deducirt  werden,  Zu 
besserem  Verstand,  unnd  Nachrichtung,  voriger  Policey  Ordnung,  und 
Constitution  angestellt."  The  special  title  of  the  Appendix  is:  "Von 
underschiedenen  Inscriptionum  Documentis." 

The  passage  in  which  the  editor  accounts  for  the  writing  of  the 
Constitution  contains  so  many  side-lights  uix)n  the  impulses  of  the  docu- 
ment, which  would  disappear  in  a  translation,  that  it  would  have  been 
quoted  in  full  in  an  appendix  if  space  had  permitted. 


48  THE  CAMERALISTS 

as  beneficiaries  on  arrival  at  a  certain  age.  If,  however,  a 
child  died  before  reaching  the  specified  age,  both  principal  and 
interest  should  belong  to  the  government.  Since,  however, 
this  forfeiture  would  occur  only  in  consequence  of  "a  special 
dispensation  of  God,"  the  editor  seriously  argues  that  the 
scheme,  for  which  he  might  have  quoted  Italian  precedents, 
ought  not  to  be  considered  inequitable,  but  rather  on  the  whole 
as  favorable  to  parents  as  to  the  government.* 

Beyond  this  general  analysis  of  the  book,  our  purpose  calls 
merely  for  a  few  notes  about  incidentals  in  its  contents.  Con- 
sidering the  volume  then  as  an  exhibit  of  a  coherent  scheme  of 
fiscal  administration,  we  may  abstract  certain  items  of  evidence 
bearing  upon  tendencies  in  fundamental  political  theory  which 
the  scheme  exhibits. 

After  a  brief  address  to  the  emperor,  the  chapter  ^^  Billico- 
Politicus"  opens  the  discussion  with  a  highly  pedantic  intro- 
duction upon  the  topic :  Qtiae  ad  Constitutionem  Belli  Turcici 
necessaria  sint.  This  is  like  stopping  when  the  house  is  afire, 
to  settle  the  metaphysical  question,  What  is  necessary  to 
constitute  a  house  afire?  The  author  nevertheless  gravely 
enumerates  as  the  elements  in  the  situation:  "Jus;  Summus 
Magistratus;  Hostes;  Justa  Causa;  et  Legitima  Belli  Sus- 
ceptio^  In  ten  pages  these  implications  are  expanded,  and 
through  brief  discussion  of  the  "mature  deliberation"  which 
must  precede  war,  the  way  is  paved  for  the  actual  problem  of 
the  tract,  viz.,  enumeration  of  all  available  sources  of  revenue. 
Without  entering  into  any  of  the  technical  details  scheduled, 

»  The  monograph  contains  56  pages,  including  an  Appendix  of  10 
pages,  and  in  addition  an  Index  of  8  pages.  The  title-page  reads: 
Constitutio  und  Ordnung.  Von  einetn  Hochniitdichen  Aerario  Liber o- 
rum,  in  welches,  von  den  Elteren,  allerhand  Summen  Celts,  fiirnemblich 
ihren  Newgebornen  Kinderen,  und  in  eventutn  ihnen  selbs,  auch  der  Obrig- 
keit,  und  Gemeiner  Wohljahrt  turn  besten  angelegt  werden:  Sampt  aller- 
hand Erbldrungen,  und  xweyen  Kinder  Rechnungen.  Beschrieben  unnd 
angestelll  von  Georgia  Obrechto  etc. 


CIVICS  OF  OBRECHT  49 

we  may  notice  that  the  sources  of  revenue  named  are  classed 
under  two  general  heads:  first,  those  which  impose  a  burden 
upon  the  persons  supplying  the  revenue;  second,  those  that 
impose  no  burden.*  This  distinction  often  reappears  in  the 
cameralistic  books.  In  general  it  does  not  correspond  with 
the  ideas  which  would  be  attached  to  the  terms  today.  A 
"burdensome"  tax  was  one  which  impaired  the  citizen's  means 
of  maintaining  his  standard  of  life.  A  "non-burdensome" 
tax  was  one  which  left  the  means  of  livelihood  intact,  but  might 
theoretically  absorb  all  increments  of  profit.* 

A  single  observation  will  suffice  in  connection  with  the 
second  class  of  resources.  The  author  names  first  among 
the  fiscal  means  which  impose  no  burden  upon  the  persons  who 
supply  the  revenue,  "6owa  oikonomia."  In  the  text  he  uses 
the  Greek  form  olKovofitav.  He  explains  that  he  means  by 
it  good  administration  in  general.  That  is,  all  functionaries 
are  to  exhibit  fidelity  and  diligence,  they  are  not  to  incur  need- 
less expenses,  they  are  to  exercise  frugality  and  parsimony, 
and  thus  to  have  in  hand  the  means  with  which  to  meet  unfore- 
seen demands.  This  observation  is  necessary,  because  a 
cardinal  datum  for  interpretation  of  the  cameralists  is  that  they 
did  not  have  the  idea,  and  consequently  did  not  have  a  word 

^  I,  De  necessariarum  rerum  comparatione:  bfc.  praecipui  de  modis, 
quibus  cum  onere  subdiiorum  pecunia  comparari  possit.  II.  De  modis 
quibus  sine  onere  subditoriim  pecunia  compariri  possit:  et  praecipui  de 
bona  Oeconomia  et  de  venditione  vel  oppigneratione  bonorum. 

»  We  may  merely  name  the  four  classes  of  resources  which  the  author 
mentions  under  the  first  head,  viz.,  (i)  imposition  of  taxes;  (2)  extra- 
ordinary taxes;  (3)  "51  annui  reditus  atque  census,  sique  portoria  et  vecti- 
galia  augentur"  (and  without  entering  into  the  question  of  the  precise 
connotation  of  these  terms  at  the  date  of  the  book,  the  author's  illustrations 
permit  us  to  render  them  in  general,  income,  property,  and  poll  taxes, 
customs  and  excise);  (4)  certain  ordinances  (constitutiones)  which  may 
yield  something  to  the  treasury.  In  a  sense  the  second  monograph,  and 
in  a  much  more  literal  sense  the  third,  fourth,  and  fifth  papers  are  elabo- 
rations of  the  author's  meaning  under  this  head. 


50  THE  CAMERALISTS 

for  "economics"  in  the  sense  attached  to  that  term  in  nineteenth- 
century  English  usage.  In  this  early  instance,  '^bona  oikonomia'' 
evidently  contained  the  rudiments,  but  only  the  rudiments, 
of  the  concept  later  represented  by  such  a  term  as  Siaais- 
haushaltung.  In  the  second  half  of  the  eighteenth  century, 
as  we  shall  see,  the  Greek  term  was  often  resented  for  agricul- 
tural management  only.  In  the  intermediate  ])eriod  its  mean- 
ing was  unprecise.  Our  concern  at  this  point  is  merely  to 
indicate  the  inchoate  condition  of  the  stage  of  administrative 
theory  represented  by  Obrecht,  and  in  particular  to  put  on 
record  this  early  use  of  a  term  which,  in  translations  into  English, 
has  been  the  innocent  occasion  of  cardinal  misjudgments  of 
essential  factors  in  the  development  of  German  social  theories. 

The  remaining  titles  in  the  monograph  refer  to  details  of 
the  fiscal  resources  of  the  time  which  yield  nothing  for  our 
pur|>ose.' 

The  second  dcKument  opens  with  a  series  of  specifications 
which  picture  most  vividly  the  desperate  financial  straits  of 
contemporary  German  rulers,  from  the  emperor  down  to  the 
minor  princes.  Incidentally  the  author  furnishes  cumulative 
evidence  that  the  "biological  analogy"  was  as  serviceable  a 
working  tcjol  for  him  as  for  some  of  the  nineteenth-century 
.sociologists.'     The  exhibit  and  the  estimate  of  money  as  the 

'  This  will  \}C  evident  from  headings  of  the  remaining  subdivisions: 
viz.,  "  De  novorum  Acceptorum  et  rctlituum  constitutione:  et  praecipue 
de  mo<lis  quibus  mediantc  justitiae  administratione  accepta  augeri 
fjossunt." 

"  I)c  modis  quibus  sine  lustitiae  administratione  accepta  atque 
redilus  altsque  onerc  sulxlitorum  augeri  possunt." 

"  De  Commeatu  Pabuli  et  Frumenti,  item  de  armis,  ct  dc  ijs  rebus, 
quae  ad  arma  jxirtincnt  (omparandis." 

"  De  Praecedentibus  ad  ronstitutionem  belli  accommodandis." 

»  Thus,  "Sintemal  wie  in  einem  Natiirlichen  Lcib,  die  nervi  prima 
animalis  sensus  et  motus  instrumenta,  auch  causa  actionum  seind:  also 
in  corpore  civili,  oder  in  einer  Repuhlica,  als  in  einem  FUrstenthumb, 


CIVICS  OF  OBRECHT  51 

vital  force  of  governments  lead  to  succinct  statement  of  the  pur- 
pose of  the  pamphlet,  viz.,  to  call  the  attention  of  rulers  and 
governors  to  the  necessity  of  diligent  reflection  about  these 
things,  and  of  adopting  the  means  to  be  proposed,  or  better 
ones,  in  the  interest  of  themselves  and  their  subjects.  The 
terms  in  which  the  author  further  urges  these  claims  first  reflect 
very  plainly  the  inchoate,  undifferentiated,  and  unorganized 
stage  of  civic  administration  in  German  states,  and  secondly, 
they  contain  a  touch  which  marks  an  early  form  of  a  moral 
consideration  not  at  that  time  very  effective,  but  later  of  co-or- 
dinate rank  with  the  requirements  for  offensive  and  defensive 
strength  against  external  enemies.  In  a  word  Obrecht  argues 
that  without  money  properly  to  pay  civil  employees,  rulers 
cannot  protect  the  people  against  the  injustices  of  their  own 
servants.  He  observes  in  this  connection  that  "although  there 
are  to  be  sure  many  magistri,  as  Bodinus  calls  them,"  who 
are  always  well  equipped  with  means  of  raising  money,  yet 
usually  these  means  tend  not  merely  to  burden  the  subjects 
but  completely  to  strip  them.  No  one  appears  to  point  out 
means  which  would  be  just  and  lucrative,  and  at  the  same  time 
serviceable  for  all  sorts  of  improvement.  He  proposes,  there- 
fore, to  present  a  scheme  which  would  satisfy  these  require- 
ments. 

The  body  of  the  essay  is  divided  on  the  lines  drawn  in  the 
previous  paper,  viz.,  first,  means  for  raising  revenues  by  bur- 

Graffschafft,  Herrschafft,  und  in  fiirnemmen  Statten,  seind  Gelt  und 
Gut  gleichsam  die  nervi,  und  instrumenta,  ohn  wclche  kein  Respublica, 
angericht,  gebessert,  und  so  wol  zu  Friedens  Zeit,  als  in  Kriegs  Empc- 
rungen,  unnd  anderen  hochbetrangten  Zustanden,  erhalten  werden  kan, 
etc."  A  little  later  the  figure  continues:  "Dann  wclcher  gestalt  Gelt 
und  Gut  nit  weniger  Reipublicae  von  nohten  seind,  als  im  Menschlichen 
Leib  seind  die  nervi  senlienies,  welche  von  dem  Him  entspringen  sollenj 
ebner  massen  Gelt  und  Gut  gebiihrlicher  weiss  zuerlangen,  gehort  einer 
jeden  Oberkeit  zu,  die  gleichsam  in  Republica,  als  in  cor  pore  civili, 
anstatt  Hirns  ist,  und  hat  solch  corpus  voUkommlich  zu  regieren,  etc." 


S3  THE  CAMERALISTS 

dening  the  subjects ;  second,  means  which  would  not  burden 
the  subjects.  This  whole  range  of  governmental  problems 
is  put  under  the  head,  "Oeconomica  administratio."  In  gen- 
eral the  scheme  is  merely  an  amplification  of  ideas  contained 
in  the  earlier  essay.  The  specific  propositions  do  not  concern 
us,  but  the  conditions  which  were  to  be  met  and  the  status  of 
reasoning  about  them  may  be  somewhat  more  approximately 
understood  by  reference  to  the  titles  of  chapters.^ 

If  this  were  a  history  of  administrative  technique,  or  of 
administrative  technology,  Obrecht's  book  would  furnish  many 
details  which  would  mark  a  stage  in  the  process.  As  we  are 
in  search  of  the  fundamental  conceptions  and  ultimate  pur- 
poses of  cameralism,  these  details  are  interesting  only  in  so 
far  as  they  bear  testimony  about  those  conceptions  and  pur- 
poses. Not  because  they  immediately  yield  much  information 
on  these  points,  but  for  use  later  in  connection  with  other  evi- 
dence, we  may  note  a  few  items  of  more  than  merely  administra- 
tive significance. 

In  the  first  place,  Obrecht  seems  to  have  understood  in  a 
general  way  the  impolicy  of  debasing  the  coinage.  Thus  he 
says  (p.  io8): 

That  today  certain  mammon  brothers,  in  search  of  selfish  gain, 
seek  all  sorts  of  private  advantage  with  the  different  coins,  that  they 
diminish  and  weaken  the  same  in  weight  and  value  [SchroU  und  Korn] 
is  directly  contrary  to  all  laws,  also  to  various  edicts  of  the  Holy 
Empire  with  respect  to  coinage,  and  brings  with  it  beyond  all  doubt 
the  curse  of  God  and  temporal  punishment. 

In  the  second  place,  Obrecht  represents  a  stage  and  t)rpe 
of  political  thinking  in  which  the  traditional  taboo  of  commerce 
and  trade  as  pursuits  for  members  of  the  nobility  began  to  be 
called  in  question.  Thus,  after  citing  a  number  of  opinions 
on  the  conventional  side,  he  asserts  (p.  iii): 

1  These  were  to  have  appeared  in  an  appendix. 


CIVICS  OF  OBRECHT  53 

I  however  regard  commerce  as  in  a  way  necessary  for  a  republic; 
and  so  necessary,  indeed,  that  it  cannot  be  separated  from  the  body 
of  the  republic.     For  merchants  are  in  the  body  of  the  republic,  as 

It  were,  attendants,  carriers,  feet,  etc consequently,  I  hold  it 

as  more  honorable  than  despicable  when  noble  and  high  persons 
(any  on  trade  for  the  sake  of  lightening  the  burdens  of  their  subjects, 
and  of  discharging  public  obligations  with  the  least  difficulty. 

To  this  item  should  be  added  a  later  passage,  viz.  (p.  122): 

A  ruler  and  overlord  should  make  it  an  object  of  diligent  atten- 
tion that  in  his  towns  and  country  regions,  so  far  as  opportunity 
allows,  all  sorts  of  traders  should  be  located.  For  the  traders  not 
only  bring  into  the  country  all  sorts  of  necesjsary  wares,  at  their  own 
cost  and  risk,  but  they  also  draw  out  of  the  country  those  wares  of 

which  the  country  has  a  superabundance But  a  ruler  should 

look  out  for  the  following  four  points:  I,  that  the  merchants  should 
carry  on  no  forbidden  traffic,  nor  should  they  bring  forbidden  wares 
into  the  country,  nor  carry  them  out  to  forbidden  places;  II,  that 
no  scarcity,  nor  hindrance  of  the  subjects  in  disposing  of  their  wares, 
should  be  brought  about  by  the  merchants;  III,  that  they  should 
make  no  harmful  and  usurious  bargains  but  their  transactions  should 
all  tend  to  the  common  advantage,  and  not  to  the  injury  of  their 
neighbors;  IV,  that  the  merchants  should  be  protected  against  all 
unjust  violence,  for  this  is  to  the  advantage  not  only  of  the  merchants 
themselves,  but  of  the  subjects  in  general. 

In  the  third  place,  Obrecht  schedules  encouragement  of 
navigation  as  a  means  of  enlarging  a  state's  revenues.  He 
seems  to  have  no  suspicion  of  questions  about  "balance  of 
trade,"  but  pleads  artlessly  for  "provision  of  vessels  tha*  may 
bring  all  sorts  of  goods  and  wares  from  foreign  ports,  that  the 
same  may  be  sold  again." 

Fourthly,  he  proposes  advances  from  the  princely  chest, 
to  merchants  who  bring  in  foreign  goods.  The  chief  reason 
for  this  proposal  seems  to  be  that  the  interest  on  the  advances 
would  be  a  considerable  source  of  profit  to  the  prince. 

Fifth,  Obrecht  recommends  purchase  by  government  of 


54  THE  CAMERALISTS 

certain  fuod  stuffs,  wine,  etc.,  to  be  held  as  a  resource  against 
possible  scarcity  prices,  and  then  to  be  sold  al  reasonable  rates, 
to  the  advantage  both  of  government  and  subjects. 

Promotion  of  artisanship  is  also  urged,  and  for  similar 
reasons.  At  the  same  time  dangers  from  improper  combina- 
tions of  hand-workers  are  suggested,  and  severe  punishments 
for  misusing  such  organization  are  recommended.  In  connec- 
tion with  the  advice  that,  to  promote  trade  and  crafts,  fairs 
and  markets  should  be  arranged,  a  bare  hint  of  the  later  popu- 
lation doctrine  appears,  viz.  (i).  127): 

And  it  is  beyond  all  doubt  that  when  all  the  above  is  set  in  opera- 
tion with  zeal,  it  will  be  to  the  advantage  of  rulers  and  ovedords  in 
this  respect  further,  that  they  will  have  more  populous  and  belter 
ai)pointcd  towns  and  territories,  and  that  in  consequence  the  various 
revenues  will  be  strongly  increased  and  improved. 

Disapproval  of  debts  to  foreigners,  which  later  became  a 
cameralistic  dogma,  appears  here  as  a  mild  preference:  thus 
(p.   129): 

If  a  ruler  is  burdened  with  many  and  heavy  foreign  interest 
charges  ....  it  is  advisable  that  he  raise  the  amount  from  his 
subjects  who  have  loanable  money,  and  pay  the  interest  to  tbem 
rather  than  to  foreigners,  for  in  this  way  expenses  and  losses  may 
Ixi  avoided. 

The  first  paragraph  of  the  chapter,  "Constitutio  Aerarij 
Sancti,"  furnishes  another  direct  testimony,  the  stronger 
because  it  was  inadvertent,  as  to  the  central  purpose  which 
was  molding  administrative  theory  and  policy.  It  is  a  pas- 
sage which  distinctly  locates  the  moving  springs  of  cameralism. 
Translated  according  to  the  spirit  rather  than  the  letter  it  is 
as  follows: 

Since  it  is  known  to  all  of  good  understanding,  and  an  open  secret, 
and  attested  by  daily  experience,  that  in  these  last  troublous  times 
there  is  scarcely  a  government  whose  ordinary  resources  are  not 
daily  and  hourly  exhausted,  and  therefore  scarcely  one  can  at  all 


CIVICS  OF  OBRECHT  55 

times  be  happily  administered  and  maintained  in  constant  security 
by  means  of  the  ordinary  revenues;  but  on  the  contrary  unless  by 
the  side  of  these  customary  revenues  a  government  institutes,  with 
the  utmost  care,  through  all  sorts  of  just  and  righteous  means,  a 
special  and  extraordinary  treasury,  such  a  government  and  Policey, 
at  a  time  of  unforeseen  war,  revolts,  and  other  dangers,  will  stand 
unprotected  and  open  to  pillage  and  enemies,  and  in  the  presence  of 
such  danger  and  violence  it  can  neither  be  protected  nor  administered. 
And  although  by  extraordinary  efforts  under  such  circumstances 
money  may  be  raised,  yet  if  the  money  is  collected,  and  the  imminent 
danger  is  averted,  yet  another  danger  immediately  follows,  namely, 
that  the  growing  burden  of  interest  charges  will  ruin  the  state,  as  was 
the  case  with  the  Greek  republics,  and  especially  Lacedaemonia, 
which  were  ruined  by  borrowing  from  the  Persian  and  Egyptian 
kings.  Hence  it  is  necessary  to  show  how  these  dangers  may  be 
overcome  by  an  extraordinary  treasury. 

As  we  shall  attempt  to  show,  this  problem  of  ways  and 
means  to  cover  the  expanding  fiscal  needs  of  the  state  was  the 
central  purpose  which  gave  peculiar  character  to  cameralism. 
All  the  incidental  tenets  of  this  technology,  whether  they  were 
the  opinions  of  exceptional  writers  or  substantially  the  con- 
sensus of  all,  must  be  interpreted  by  their  connection  with 
this  main  interest. 

This  particular  Constitutio  is  partly  in  the  form  of  an  ordi- 
nance to  be  promulgated  by  rulers:  partly  in  the  ordinary 
essay  form  on  the  merits  of  certain  fiscal  propositions.  It 
contains  nothing  further  in  principle  necessary  for  our  purjjose. 

In  the  fourth  document,  Policey  Ordnung,  Oljrecht  displays 
foresight  which  entitles  him  to  higher  rank  in  the  rolls  of  Ger- 
man political  writers  than  the  historians  of  his  own  country 
have  assigned.  In  general,  subsequent  events  conformed 
to  his  views,  and  the  Policey  system  afterward  developed,  to 
which  we  must  give  so  much  attention  in  later  portions  of  this 
book,  was  entirely  contained  in  principle  in  his  proposals. 
Without  attempting  to  prove  this  in  detail,  we  may  briefly  note 


56  TfiE  camp:ralists 

the  standpoint  from  which  his  suggestions  issued  and  the  aims 
which  he  had  in  view. 

In  the  Introduction  the  author  points  out  that  all  publicists 
have  had  regard  ffjr  two  considerations,  and  have  urged  them 
upon  magistrates,  viz.,  first,  the  census  and  censorship,  "the 
fulcra  and  j)illars  of  jjolitics,  and  the  supports  on  which  all 
Policey  must  rest;"  second,  "reliable  information  and  sufficient 
science  possessed  by  every  magistrate  concerning  the  structure 
and  organization  of  the  Policey^ 

As  to  the  first  of  these  points,  Obrecht  states  that  existing 
administration  makes  use  of  census  and  censorship,  yet  in 
no  adequate  fashion;  indeed,  he  holds  that  if  it  were  possible 
the  forms  in  use  should  be  altogether  abolished,  and  more 
adequate  systems  substituted.  He  concedes  that  such  abrupt 
change  would  be  imj)racticable,  and  in  the  case  of  the  census  par- 
ticularly recommends  that  the  methods  now  in  use  be  retained. 

With  reference  to  the  censorship,  however,  he  declares 
that  its  policy  may  be  essentially  either  preventive  or  punitive. 
Just  here  Obrecht's  foresight  is  exceptional.  He  declares  that 
jwjlice  programmes  of  his  time  know  nothing  of  preventive 
policies.  The  chief  emphasis  of  the  document  falls  therefore 
on  the  outline  of  a  police  policy  calculated  to  improve  the 
morale  of  the  people,  and  thus  not  merely  to  diminish  vice  and 
crime,  but  to  raise  the  general  efficiency  of  the  population. 
Without  asking  the  question  here  whether  this  is  a  proper 
function  of  g(A'emments,  we  have  to  observe  at  the  outset  that 
(icrman  [)olitical  theory  progressively  assumed  that  such 
guardianship  and  promotion  of  public  morals  formed  a  neces- 
sary part  of  governmental  res[>onsibility.  Obrecht  was  accord- 
ingly a  pioneer  among  post-Reformation  thinkers  in  striking 
out  a  f)ath  which  became  one  of  the  trunk  lines  of  later 
administrative  theor>'.' 

'  The  inirorluction  is  such  a  vivid  reflection  of  the  situation  within 
which  Ohrc(ht  wrote  that  it  would  have  been  reproduced  in  full  if  space 
had  fjcrmiticd. 


CIVICS  OF  OBRECHT  57 

The  Preface  to  the  proposed  Constitution,  which  is  drafted 
in  the  form  of  a  royal  rescript,  reiterates  the  underlying  pur- 
pose of  the  proposition  in  terms  which  a  translation  cannot 
properly  represent,  but  the  substance  is  approximately  this: 

The  following  Police  Order  and  Constitution,  with  its  seven 
Sanctions  [Sanctionibus]  is  ordained  by  us  especially  that  we  may 
every  year,  and  as  far  as  practicable  at  all  times,  have  reliable  infor- 
mation how  matters  stand  with  all  our  subjects,  young  and  old,  rich 
and  poor,  in  all  parts  of  our  jurisdiction  and  territory,  and  also  how 
matters  stand  with  our  whole  Policey,  and  all  of  its  branches,  and 
how,  in  this  later  wholly  perverted  time,  they  may  be  protected 
against  ruin,  and  may  be  sustained  in  constant  integrity;  and  how 
we  may  bring  it  about,  after  ascertaining  all  the  facts,  that  our  sub- 
jects may  rightly,  well  and  usefully  bring  up  their  children,  and 
themselves  lead  a  Christian,  worthy  life,  and  thus  so  conduct 
themselves  that  they  may  be  to  their  children,  to  us  their  divinely 
appointed  rulers,  to  their  neighbor,  and  to  the  common  weal,  a 
blessing  and  an  honor,  to  their  own  temporal  and  eternal  advantage. 

The  first  Sanction  covered  a  system  of  registration  of  births, 
both  legitimate  and  illegitimate;  the  second,  registration  and 
guardianship  of  orphans  and  widows;  the  third,  registration 
and  supervision  of  young  men  "nearer  their  twentieth  than 
their  twenty-third  year;"  the  fourth,  registration  and  con- 
tinued observation  of  all  other  male  persons,  above  the  twenty- 
third  year,  "in  order  that  we  may  have  direct  knowledge 
of  the  character  of  all  these  persons  under  our  whole  govern- 
ment:"   the  fifth,  registration  of  marriage  intentions;^    the 

'  For  the  reason  parenthetically  assigned:  Because  " Matrimonia" 
arc  "von  den  Politicis  recht  und  wol  principia  Urbium,  seminaria  Rerum- 
publicarutn,  et  jundamenta  Ret  familiaris  genandt  werden."  In  this 
connection  the  plan  contemplates  the  appointment  of  officials  who  should 
censor  the  wedding  customs,  particularly  with  reference  to  extravagant 
outlays.  One  of  the  ends  in  view  was  to  prevent  squandering  of  the 
savings  with  which  housekeeping  must  be  set  up.  The  word  here  used 
for  that  idea  is  worth  our  notice.  The  phrase  is:  "auss  welchem  sie 
ihre  Otconomi  anstellen  sollen." 


58  THF  CAMERALISTS 

sixth,  registration  of  intentions  of  immigrants  to  become  citi- 
zens, and  of  other  cases  of  change  of  residence  by  strangers 
or  subjects;  seventh,  registration  of  deaths,  including  certain 
related  details,  particularly  concerning  surviving  heirs. 

The  explanations  subjoined  to  this  third  paragraph,  or 
chapter,  take  up  in  turn  the  seven  "sanctions,"  and  propose 
details,  V)eginning  with  the  price  to  be  paid  ior  each  type  of 
registration,  and  including  arguments  intended  to  show  the 
benefits  that  would  accrue,  first  to  individuals,  then  to  the  \)\i\)- 
lic,  from  adoption  of  the  programme.  For  example,  we  find  at 
.>nce  (p.  215)  the  suggestion  that  each  child  registered  under 
the  first  "sancdon,"  should  receive  ein  Geburtsbriejff;  obviously 
an  early,  if  not  the  earliest  proposal  of  a  detail  of  police  tech- 
nique which  later  became  a  matter  of  course. 

On  the  side  of  the  public  advantages  of  the  propt)sed  pro- 
gramme, Obrecht  urges,  still  under  the  device  of  a  supposed 
ordinance  or  rescript  (pp.  229  ff.),  that,  at  all  times,  both  in  war 
and  peace,  governments  would  be  able  to  administer  more  in- 
telligently; they  could  maintain  the  common  welfare  {Gemeitie 
Wolfart)  with  more  intelligence  and  energy;  they  could  also 
come  to  the  assistance  of  the  subjects  more  directly  and  effi- 
ciently; they  could,  fourth,  through  the  fidelity  of  the  various 
sorts  of  Deputaien  contemplated  in  the  programme,  in  many 
ways  promote  the  common  advantage  {Gemeinen  \uiz)  better 
than  without  such  (organization. 

It  cannot  be  said  that  this  final  schedule  of  reasons  for  adopt- 
ing the  programme  is  likely  to  affect  the  modern  reader  as  very 
convincing.  The  underlying  fiscal  purpose,  viz.,  the  collection 
of  fees  from  the  different  registrations,  is  too  obvious,  while 
the  advantages  urged  are  both  vague  and  problematical.  The 
same  is  more  evidently  true  of  the  insurance  of  children  pro- 
posed in  the  last  document,  on  which  further  comment  is 
unnecessary.'  These  things  do  not,  however,  diminish  the 
'  Vide  above,  p.  47. 


CIVICS  OF  OBRECHT  59 

evidential  value  of  such  a  writer  as  Obrecht.  Whether  he 
actually  exerted  much  influence  or  little,  either  upon  adminis- 
trative organization  or  upon  academic  theory,  his  book  reflects 
beginnings  of  theoretical  and  practical  tendencies  in  ways 
which  make  their  essential  impulses  much  more  evident  than 
they  appear  in  their  later  more  complex  variations. 


CHAPTER  IV 
THE  CAMERALISTICS  OF  SECKENDORFF 

Veit  Ludwig  von  SeckendorfF  was  bom  in  1626  and  died 
in  1692.  His  most  persistent  influence  was  exerted  through 
two  books,  Der  Teutsche  Fiirsten  Staat,  and  Der  Christen 
Staat.^  For  our  purposes,  these  books,  rather  than  details  of 
Seckendorff's  life,  are  all-important.  Enough  of  his  biography 
may  be  noted,  however,  to  indicate  the  interests  for  which 
he  spoke.  In  childhood,  Seckendorff  was  taught  at  home, 
while  his  father  was  most  of  the  time  in  the  wars.  He  was 
later  sent  to  school  in  Coburg  and  Miihlhausen.  In  1636  he 
went  with  his  mother  to  Erfurt,  where  the  foundations  of  his 
more  mature  knowledge  were  laid.  He  is  said  to  have  com- 
posed Latin  orations  at  the  age  of  eleven.  He  was  a  companion 
of  two  WUrttemburg  princes  in  1639.  He  attracted  the  atten- 
tion of  Herzog  Ernst  of  Gotha,  who  sent  him  to  the  Gotha 
Gymnasium  in  1640.  Soon  after  this  his  father  was  beheaded 
on  the  charge  of  intended  defection  to  the  emperor.  The 
family  was  provided  for,  however,  in  recognition  of  the  father's 
previous  services.  The  son  went  the  same  year  to  the  Univer- 
sity of  Strassburg,  where  for  several  years  he  studied  philosophy, 
jurisprudence,  and  history.  In  1645,  on  his  way  to  continue 
study  at  Erfurt,  he  visited  the  court  of  Gotha.  This  was  the 
turning-point  of  his  life.  The  duke  gave  him  200  Thaler  for 
a  visit  to  the  Low  Countries,  and  on  his  return  appointed  him 
Hof junker  and  superintendent  of  the  ducal  library.  In  these 
positions  his  chief  duty  was  to  summarize  selected  books  and 
recite  their  contents  to  the  duke  in  his  leisure  hours,  on  Sundays 

I  Instead  of  reducing  the  various  forms  of  these  titles  to  a  single 
style,  the  usage  of  the  passages  from  which  they  have  been  cited  has 
been  followed. 

60 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SFCKEXDORFF  6t 

or  (iurinjj;  journeys.  In  1652,  in  his  twcnly-scvcnth  year,  ho 
became  Hof-  und  Jnstiticnratli.  The  first  of  his  imporlanl 
b(X)k5,  the  Fiirsten  Stoat,  was  wrilten  in  1655.  "It  may  be 
regarded  as  a  sort  of  handbook  of  German  civil  law,  and  was 
valued  as  such;  on  the  other  hand,  it  had  the  si)ecial  approval 
of  contemporaries,  because  it  contained  a  systematic  arrange- 
ment of  rules  and  prescriptions  for  a  well-regulated  govern- 
mental administration,  based  on  the  model  of  the  existing 
government  of  Gotha."  Seckendorff  was  soon  promoted  to 
the  position  of  Geheimer  Hof-  und  Kammerrath  im  Verwaltungs- 
dienst,  and  in  1664  to  the  highest  dignity  in  the  duchy,  that 
of  chancellor.  His  ser\ices  were  esi>ecially  valued  in  finance, 
but  he  was  also  a  power  in  political,  ecclesiastical,  and  educa- 
tional reform.  He  collaborated  (1666)  with  the  scholars  Arto- 
p<:>eus  and  Bockler  on  a  Compendium  historiae  ecclesiasticae, 
intended  primarily  for  the  Gymnasium  in  Gotha,  but  after- 
ward widely  used.  In  1664  he  accepted  the  call  of  Duke 
Moritz  of  Sachsenzeitz.  as  Kanzler  und  Consistoriai-Prdsident. 
He  retained  the  position  till  the  death  of  Moritz  in  1681,  then 
resigned  all  his  responsibilities  except  that  of  Landschafts- 
direcior  von  Altenburg,  and  retired  to  his  estate,  Menselwitz, 
near  Altenburg.  The  Christen  Staat  (1685)  did  much  to  pro- 
mote the  tendency  toward  pietism,  although  the  author  was 
not  himself  strictly  a  pietist.  In  reply  to  the  Jesuit  de  Maim- 
bourg  {Histoire  du  Lutheranism,  Paris,  1680)  Seckendorff 
wrote  in  an  incredibly  short  time  a  work  which  must  still  be 
consulted  by  all  historians  of  the  Reformation.'  He  arrived 
at  Halle,  as  chancellor  of  the  new  university,  Octoljer  31,  1692, 
but  died  December  18  following.* 

'  CommfrUarius  historic,  us  et  apologetUus  de  Lutheranismo  seu  de 
reformatione,  1688-92. 

»  Th.  Kolde,  in  AU.  d  Bib  ,  title  "Seckendorff,"  and  Roscher,  inloc. 
This  account  should  be  compared  with  Seckendorff's  own  recollections 
in  the  dedication  cA  Der  Chrislenstat. 


62  THE  CAMERALISTS 

Seckendorff's  close  relations  with  Duke  Ernst  of  Gotha 
were  prime  factors  in  his  career.  Ernst  was  eminent  among 
the  petty  princes  of  his  century.  His  reputation  for  piety 
was  popularized  in  the  nickname  "Praying  Ernst,"  and  he 
was  later  known  as  "Ernst  the  Pious."  His  ecclesiastical 
laws  have  been  called  a  complete  course  in  pastoral  theology. 
He  was  the  father  of  twenty-two  children,  and  in  the  manage- 
ment of  his  household  and  of  his  state  he  was  regarded  as  an 
edifying  example.  Seckendorfif  systematized  Duke  Ernst's 
scheme  of  life.  He  virtually  composed  Ernst's  practices  as 
a  manager  into  a  didactic  treatise.  According  to  the  Preface 
of  the  second  edition  of  Der  Fiirsten  Slaat,  his  original  intention 
was  to  treat  only  of  rules  for  a  single  German  principality, 
evidently  Gotha,  but  his  plan  was  afterward  extended  to  include 
all  German  states  of  the  secularized  Protestant  class. 

Roscher  regards  it  as  a  second  cardinal  fact  in  Seckendorff's 
career  that,  shortly  before  his  death,  he  gave  up  the  life  of 
retirement  upon  his  estate,  to  accept  the  chancellorship  of  the 
new  University  of  Halle.  The  rea.sons  for  Roscher's  opinion 
that  this  change  was  significant  are  not  apparent.  It  was  a 
generation  after  his  most  important  book  appeared,  and  six 
years  after  publication  of  the  volume  next  in  importance.  Such 
migrations  were  by  no  means  exceptional,  and  in  this  instance 
nothing  can  be  inferred  from  the  incident  which  has  the  slight- 
est bearing  upon  Seckendorff  in  the  only  relation  in  which  he 
was  significant  for  Roscher's  professed  purpose,  viz.,  inter- 
pretation of  the  history  of  German  economics.  This  emphasis 
upon  a  merely  personal  detail  is  characteristic.  Roscher's 
service  to  science  was  principally  in  assembling  details.  He 
was  much  less  successful  in  estimating  their  value. 

Seckendorff  is  classified  by  Roscher  as  conservative,  in  the 
sense  of  adhering  to  the  old  ways,  while  he  was  liberal,  in  the 
sense  of  thinking  freely,  if  the  phrase  may  be  accommodated 
to  the  rigors  of  his  time.     He  was  not  attracted  by  the  innova- 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SECKENDORFF  63 

tions  in  the  Zeitgeist  of  his  period,  but  clung  to  the  traditions 
of  the  generations  before  the  Thirty  Years'  War.  In  this 
respect  he  was  in  nearly  the  same  antithesis  with  leading  pub- 
licists and  mercantilists  of  his  time,  that  is,  to  the  theories 
of  Leopold  I  and  of  the  Great  Elector,  in  which  Sully  stood  to 
Colbert,  or  in  the  eighteenth  century,  Justus  Moser  to  the  politi- 
cal scientists  of  the  time  of  Frederick  the  Great  and  Joseph  II. 

Moreover,  Seckendorfl  was  attached  to  the  Reformation 
type  of  piety,  and  in  spite  of  the  tendency  of  the  time  in  the 
other  direction,  he  gave  his  political  doctrines  a  strong  religious 
shading. 

Roscher  further  characterizes  Seckendorfif  as  "in  civic  life 
no  more  an  absolutist  than  in  court  life  he  was  a  sycophant." 
This  is  true  in  the  sense  that  he  dared  to  regard  the  will  of 
God  as  paramount  to  the  will  of  the  prince;  but  it  is  not  true 
in  the  sense  that  he  believed  any  power  on  earth  was  justified 
in  holding  the  prince  to  account  for  his  acts.  In  other  words, 
political  theory  had  virtually  outgrown  the  conception  that  the 
will  of  the  prince  was  the  highest  moral  law,  but  it  still  retained 
the  conception  that  the  will  of  the  prince  was  the  ultimate 
civic  law.  Seckendorff  was  consequently  the  mouthpiece  of 
the  type  of  German  state  in  the  middle  of  the  seventeenth 
century  in  which  the  assumption  was  fundamental.  We  shall 
speak  of  this  as  quasi-absolutism.  Absolutism  in  the  strictest 
sense  it  was  not.  From  the  point  of  view  of  modem  democracy 
it  was  virtual  absolutism.  That  is,  it  was  a  theory  that  no 
one  but  God  had  a  right  to  discipline  the  prince,  because  he 
was  responsible  only  to  that  divine  power  by  whose  grace  he 
had  been  made  sovereign  over  a  defined  group  of  men.^ 

We  have  then  to  deal,  not  with  the  first,  but  with  one  of 
the  early  doctrinaires  and  ofl&ciating  administrators  of  the  type 
of  state  thus  indicated.    Their  task  was  to  systematize  the 

'  For  confirmation  of  this  judgment  vide  below,  pp.  73  ff.;  cf.  doc- 
trine of  Schroder,  pp.  137  flf. 


64  THE  CAMERALISTS 

administrative  routine  of  that  type  of  state.  The  theory  and 
the  application  were  not  so  sharply  distinguished  as  they  have 
been  in  later  times.  The  work  of  the  cameralists  was  so  to  serve 
their  quasi-absolute  lords  tjjat  the  power  and  efficiency  of  their 
states  would  be  developed,  and  that  their  purposes  with  refer- 
ence to  competing  states  would  be  promoted.  All  the  doc- 
trines of  the  cameralists  were  in  fact  centered  about  this  main 
purpose,  and  all  their  theories  and  judgments  must  be  under- 
stood accordingly.* 

As  a  side-light  upon  the  foregoing  propositions,  scarcely 
anything  could  be  more  illuminating  than  the  dedication  of 
Der  Fursten  Stoat.  Because  our  language  makes  an  exact 
rendering  of  the  ceremonial  titles  and  phrases  impossible,  we 
quote  the  form  of  address  in  the  original,  viz.:  Dem  Durch- 
Idtichtigsten,  Hochgebornen  Fursten  und  Herrn,  Herrn  Johann 
Georgen  Erh-Printzen  der  Chur-  und  Hertzogen  zu  Sachsen, 
JUlich,  Cleve  und  Bergk,  Landgrafen  in  Thiiringen,  Mark- 

'  For  the  conditions  of  the  Peace  of  Westphalia  which  furnished 
the  general  setting  within  which  the  problems  of  the  several  states  of 
Germany  are  to  be  explained,  vide  Tillinghast's  Ploetz,  p.  316,  following 
K.  F.  Eichhorn,  Deutsche  Stoats-  u.  Rechtsgeschichte,  IV,  522  ff.  The 
most  useful  outline  of  the  condition  of  Germany  in  the  period  in  which 
Seckeadorfl  wrote  is  in  Bryce,  Holy  Roman  Empire,  chap.  xx.  Vide 
Tillinghast,  loc.  cit.,  p.  371.  "The  Emperor  was  Leopold  I,  1658-1705. 
After  1663  permanent  diet  at  Regensburg,  consisting  of  the  representa- 
tives of  the  eight  electors,  the  sixty-nine  ecclesiastical,  the  ninety-six 
secular  princes,  and  the  imp>erial  cities.  (A  miracle  of  tedious  legisla- 
tion, often  degenerating  into  a  squabble  for  precedence.  'A  bladeless 
knife  without  a  handle'.)  Corpus  Catholicorum  and  Corpus  Evangeli- 
corum  (the  corporate  organizations  of  the  Catholic  and  the  evangelical 
estates,  the  latter  being  the  most  important.  This  organization  of  the 
Protestant  estates  had  existed,  i~n  fact,  since  the  latter  half  of  the  sixteenth 
century,  but  it  was  legally  recognized  in  the  Peace  of  Westphalia,  when 
it  was  decreed  that  in  the  diet  matters  relating  to  religion  and  the  church 
should  not  be  decided  by  a  majority,  but  should  be  settled  by  conference 
and  agreement  between  the  Catholic  and  Protestant  estates,  as  organized 
corporations.)." 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SECKENDORFF  65 

grafen  zu  Meissen,  auch  Ober-  und  Nieder-Lausznilz,  Grafen 
zu  der  Marck  und  Ravensberg,  Herrn  zu  Ravenstein,  err.  Afei- 
nem  gnddigsten  Herrn,  &"c.  Durchlduchtigster,  Hoclige- 
bohrner,  Gnddigster  Fiirst  und  Herr,  dr'c. 

The  quaintness  of  expression  in  the  extremely  adroit  and 
non-committal  dedication  itself  cannot  be  reproduced  in 
English.  The  translation  can  convey  only  the  substance  of  the 
thought,  the  most  obvious  peculiarity  of  which  is  the  rhetorical 
device  of  suggestion,  instead  of  direct  statement.  It  is  as 
follows: 

The  wisdom,  through  which  kingdoms,  principalities,  and  lands 
are  happily  governed,  is  in  its  origin  divine,  in  itself  it  is  lordly  and 
incomparable,  and  comprehends  in  its  scope  and  generality  all  that 
which  is  found  piecemeal  in  other  sciences.  It  is  within  the  circum- 
ference of  each  land  the  indispensable  sun,  through  which  everything 
is  illuminated,  warmed,  and  nourished.  It  is  to  be  compared  with 
an  inexhaustible  sea,  into  which  all  other  wisdoms  and  arts  flow, 
and  through  high  and  occult  art,  for  the  common  welfare,  is  again 
discharged  and  distributed  through  the  whole  land.  It  is  an  ever- 
green of  Paradise  of  all  the  most  beautiful  and  useful  plants,  of  the 
virtues  and  good  ordinances,  each  of  which  in  its  turn  and  place 
bears  grateful  fruits.  This  wisdom  King  Solomon  prayed  the  All- 
nise  to  grant  for  his  royal  office,  with  which  he  received  also  the  great- 
est treasures  and  riches  of  the  world  as  an  additional  gift.  Foolish 
therefore  those  who  would  penetrate  into  the  secrets  of  governments 
without  the  attendance  and  favor  of  this  goddess.  All  those  fall 
into  gross  sin  who,  apart  from  the  divinely  appointed  and  by  naiure 
sanctioned  way,  instead  of  such  excellent  royal  and  lofty  science, 
in  the  name  of  the  state  and  of  politics,  offer  per\'erse  and  crafty 
counsel  which  plunges  themselves  and  whole  lands  into  ruin.  For 
what  reasons  and  occasions,  Most  Gracious  Lord,  I  was  moved  to 
the  publication  of  the  present  little-worthy  work,  in  which,  according 
to  the  slight  measure  of  my  feeble  powers,  I  sought  to  bring  together 
a  few  beams  of  this  bright  illuminating  sun,  certain  drops  from  this 
great  sea,  and  certain  fruits  from  such  a  general  world-garden,  and 
according  to  opportunity  to  make  them  useful  for  the  lands  and  prin- 


66  TIIK  CAMERALISTS 

cipalities  of  our  German  fatherland,  is  to  a  certain  extent  set  forth 
in  the  Preface,  wherein  also,  with  humblest  apologies  to  your  most 
illustrious  highness,  it  is  explained  through  what  motive  I  allowed 
myself  to  seek,  under  your  eminent  name,  protection  for  this  very 
imperfect  book.  May  it  please  you  most  graciously  to  accept  this 
public  expression  of  my  most  submissive  zeal,  as  I  hereby  in  humility 
and  highest  veneration  most  obediently  profess  it,  and  with  your 
gracious  permission  I  remain 

His  Most  Illustrious  Highness' 

Most  Submissive 

Veit  Ludwig  von  Seckendorff 

According  to  the  standards  of  the  time,  this  wretched  stuff 
was  not  fulsome,  it  was  merely  conventional.  Something  of 
the  sort,  often  much  more  extravagant,  occurs  in  the  dedications 
of  most  of  the  cameralistic  books.  We  shall  allow  this  sample 
to  stand  for  all.  It  is  turgid  of  course,  but  in  that  respect  it 
fairly  reflects  the  stage  of  thought  which  it  attempted  to  express. 
The  style  was  appropriate  to  the  confused  thinking  which  pre- 
vailed about  everything  pertaining  to  social  relations.  But 
this  is  merely  incidental.  The  main  thing  is  that  these  forms, 
dictated  by  tradition  in  one  respect,  yet  artfully  artless  in  another, 
fairly  represent  the  attitude  of  the  cameralists  toward  the 
interests  of  men  in  civic  society.  It  was  fundamentally  an 
attitude  of  worship  toward  a  supposed  superior  personage 
endowed  with  a  prerogative  of  control  over  a  group  of  inferior 
and  subject  persons.  The  social  science  of  the  time  was  an 
effort  so  to  mobilize  the  attitude  that  the  states  which  counted 
upon  it  as  their  chief  asset  could  prosper. 

In  order  to  provide  ourselves  with  a  background  for  the 
doctrines  which  we  are  to  analyze,  we  should  from  step  to  step 
parallel  with  this  analysis  unroll  the  general  picture  of  German 
and  European  politics.  For  this  part  of  the  process  recourse 
must  be  had  to  the  historians.  We  can  merely  in  passing 
make  note  of  the  dependence  of  such  a  study  as  this  upon  their 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SECKENDORFF  67 

larger  work.     Of  the  situation  just  before  our  time  of  depar- 
ture Bryce  writes: 

To  all  parties  alike  the  result  of  the  Thirty  Years'  War  was 
thoroughly  unsatisfactory — to  the  Protestants,  who  had  lost  Bohemia, 
and  were  still  obliged  to  hold  an  inferior  place  in  the  electoral  college 
and  in  the  Diet;  to  the  Catholics,  who  were  forced  to  permit  the 
exercise  of  heretical  worship  and  leave  the  church  lands  in  the  grasp 
of  sacrilegious  spoilers:  to  the  princes,  who  could  not  throw  off  the 
burden  of  imperial  supremacy:  to  the  Emperor,  who  could  turn 
that  supremacy  to  no  practical  account.  No  other  conclusion  was 
possible  to  a  contest  in  which  everyone  had  been  vanquished  and 
no  one  victorious:  which  had  ceased  because,  while  the  reasons  for 
war  continued,  the  means  of  war  had  failed.  Nevertheless,  the  sub- 
stantial advantage  remained  with  the  German  princes,  for  they 
gained  the  formal  recognition  of  that  territorial  independence  whose 
origin  may  be  placed  as  far  back  as  the  days  of  Frederick  the  Second, 
and  the  maturity  of  which  had  been  hastened  by  the  events  of  the 
last  preceding  century.  It  was,  indeed,  not  only  recognized,  but 
justified  as  rightful  and  necessary.  For  while  the  political  situation, 
to  use  a  current  phrase,  had  changed  within  the  last  two  hundred 
years,  the  eyes  with  which  men  regarded  it  had  changed  still  more. 
Never  by  their  fiercest  enemies  in  earlier  times,  not  once  by  Popes 
or  Lombard  republics  in  the  heat  of  their  strife  with  the  Franconian 
and  the  Swabian  Caesars,  had  the  Emperors  been  reproached  as 
mere  German  kings,  or  their  claim  to  be  the  lawful  heirs  of  Rome 
denied.  The  Protestant  jurists  of  the  seventeenth  century  were  the 
first  persons  who  ventured  to  scoff  at  the  pretended  lordship  of  the 
world,  and  declare  their  empire  to  be  nothing  more  than  a  German 
monarchy,  in  dealing  with  which  no  superstitious  reverence  need 
prevent  its  subjects  from  making  the  best  terms  they  could  for  them- 
selves, and  controlling  a  sovereign  whose  religious  predilections 
bound  him  to  their  ecclesiastical  enemies 

The  Peace  of  Westphalia  is  an  era  in  the  history  of  the  Holy 
Empire  not  less  clearly  marked  than  the  coronation  of  Otto  the 
Great,  or  the  death  of  Frederick  the  Second  (1250).  As  from  the 
days  of  Maximilian  I  (1493-15 19)  it  had  borne  a  mixed  or  transitional 
character,  well  expressed  by  the  name  Romano-Germanic,  so  hence- 


68  THE  CAMERALISTS 

forth  it  is  in  everything  but  title  purely  and  solely  a  German  Empire. 
Properly,  indeed,  it  was  no  longer  an  Empire  at  all,  but  a  Federation, 
and  that  of  the  loosest  sort.  For  it  had  no  common  treasury,  no 
efficient  common  tribunals,  no  means  of  coercing  a  refractory  mem- 
ber; its  states  were  of  different  religions,  were  governed  according 
to  different  forms,  were  administered  judicially  and  financially  with 
out  any  regard  to  each  other.  The  traveller  by  rail  in  central  Ger- 
many used,  up  till  1866,  to  be  amused  to  find,  every  hour  or  two,  by 
the  change  in  the  soldiers'  uniforms,  and  in  the  colour  of  the  stripes 
on  the  railway  fences,  that  he  had  passed  out  of  one  and  into  another 
of  its  miniature  kingdoms.  Much  more  surprised  and  embarrassed 
would  he  have  been  a  century  earlier,  when,  instead  of  the  present 
twenty-two,  there  were  three  hundred  petty  principalities  between 
the  Alps  and  the  Baltic,  each  with  its  own  laws,  its  own  court  (in 
which  the  ceremonious  pomp  of  Versailles  was  faintly  reproduced), 
its  little  army,  its  separate  coinage,  its  tolls  and  custom-houses  on 
the  frontier,  its  crowd  of  meddlesome  and  pedantic  officials,  presided 
over  by  a  prime  minister  who  was  often  the  unworthy  favorite  of  his 
prince  and  sometimes  the  pensioner  of  a  foreign  court.  This  vicious 
system,  which  paralyzed  the  trade,  the  literature  and  the  political 
thought  of  Germany,  had  been  forming  itself  for  some  time,  but 
did  not  become  fully  established  until  the  Peace  of  Westphalia,  by 
finally  emancipating  the  princes  from  imperial  control,  had  left  them 
masters  in  their  own  territories.  The  impoverishment  of  the  infe- 
rior nobility,  and  the  decline  of  the  commercial  cities  caused  by  a  war 
that  had  lasted  a  whole  generation,  removed  every  counterpoise  to 
the  power  of  the  electors  and  princes,  and  made  absolutism  supreme 
just  where  abs^)lulism  is  least  defensible,  its  states  too  small  to  have 
any  public  opinion,  states  in  which  everything  depends  on  the  mon- 
arch, and  the  monarch  depends  on  his  favorites.  After  A.  d.  1648 
the  provincial  estates  or  parliaments  became  obsolete  in  most  of  these 
principalilics,  and  jwwerlcss  in  the  rest.  Germany  was  forced  to 
drink  to  its  very  dregs  the  cup  of  feudalism,  feudalism  from  which 
ail  the  .sentiment  that  once  ennobled  it  had  departed.' 

If  then  we  disregard  on  the  one  hand  the  theologians,  on 

'  Loc.  cit.,  p.  389;  vide  Ix)wcll,  Concernments  and  Parlies  in  Continen- 
tal Europe,  Vol.  I,  pp.  231-36. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SECKENDORFF  69 

the  other  hand  the  legists,  each  group  in  its  way  acting  rather 
as  ballast  or  as  a  brake  in  the  several  states  than  as  a  propulsive 
force,  the  positive  social  science  of  Germany  from  the  Peace 
of  Westphalia  to  the  Napoleonic  peril  was  the  theory  useful 
in  the  administrative  bureaus  of  these  quasi-absolute  states. 
Our  purposes  will  draw  a  sharp  line  between  the  technical 
details  of  this  theory  and  the  general  social  ideas  which  the 
theories  implied,  on  the  one  hand  as  their  basis  and  on  the 
other  hand  as  their  aims.  The  technical  details  we  shall 
ignore,  except  as  they  are  necessary  for  making  out  the  more 
important  general  ideas.  Our  principal  question  is.  What 
conceptions  of  social  relations  were  peculiar  to  the  cameralists, 
and  what  bearing  have  cameralistic  theories  upon  the  problems 
of  social  science  in  general  ? 

To  assist  in  fixing  landmarks,  we  may  say  that  Seckendorff 
was  the  Adam  Smith  of  cameralism.  The  evidence  now  in 
order  is  first  and  chief  est  in  the  two  volumes  already  named. 
We  shall  first  examine  Der  Fiirsten  Stoat. ^ 

The  Preface,  in  archaic  and  bungling  fashion,  indicates 
that  the  purpose  of  the  book  is  not  to  discuss  general  political 
ideas,  nor  forms  of  government  in  the  abstract,  but  to  furnish 
an  account  of  the  operative  machinery  of  a  typical  German 
state.  Of  this  preface,  we  may  note,  first,  that  it  indicates 
knowledge  of  only  one  previous  writer  in  precisely  this  field, 
viz.,  "an  experienced  courtier,  Herr  Lohneisen."*  Secken- 
dorflf  states,  however,  that  he  did  not  have  the  book  at  hand 
when  he  wrote,  and  that  only  a  dim  recollection  of  its  contents 
was  in  his  mind.    His  book  was  rather  the  result  of  his  own 

*  Herm  Veit  Ludwigs  von  Seckendor£f,  etc.,  Teuischer  Fiirsten 
Stoat,  nun  zumfUnfftenmal  Ubersehen  und  auffgelegt,  Auch  mit  einer  gam 
neuen  Zugabe.     Sonderbahrer  und  wichtiger  Materien  um  ein  grosses 

TheU  vermekret Anno  MDCLXXIIX.     In  my  revision  of  this 

chapter  I  have  been  able  to  refer  only  to  this  fifth  edition. 

*  Vide  above,  p.  40,  and  Roscher,  p.  116. 


70  THE  CAMERALISTS 

observation.  Second,  the  author  thinks  that  his  description 
of  a  medium-sized  state  may  easily  be  adapted  either  to  the 
largest  or  the  smallest  members  of  the  German  civic  family. 
Third,  the  author  deliberately  excludes  consideration  of  the 
abuses  which  occur  in  the  management  of  states.  He  con- 
fesses that  so  many  of  them  are  within  his  knowledge  that  it 
is  difficult  not  to  write  satirically  about  government,  but  on 
the  whole  he  thinks  it  better  to  describe  administration  as  it 
is  intended  to  be,  rather  than  as  it  really  is.  Fourth,  the 
author  protests  that  he  has  not  consciously  or  intentionally 
said  anything  in  the  book  which  invades  the  sanctity  of  imi)erial 
or  princely  prerogative.  The  fact  that  such  an  explanation 
could  be  thought  of  at  all  is  a  cardinal  symptom  of  the  arbi- 
trariness of  the  regime  which  it  reflects.  Fifth,  the  Preface 
ends  with  a  devout  invocation  of  the  divine  blessing  upon  the 
emperor  and  all  the  members  of  the  imperial  system.  Nothing 
in  this  petition  could  be  construed  as  a  direct  assertion  that 
these  governments  are  peculiarly  sacred.  The  mixture  of  poli- 
tics and  piety,  however,  is  quite  in  character  with  what  is  other- 
wise in  evidence  about  the  dominant  civic  conceptions. 

The  book  is  divided  into  four  parts.  The  first  and  shortest 
(22  pages)  is  merely  a  demand  for  a  description  of  the  external 
characteristics  of  a  state,  from  the  geographical  and  typo- 
graphical features,  the  condition  of  cultivation  and  improve- 
ment, to  the  governmental  and  social  structure.  The  second 
part  (278  pages)  apy)roximately  includes  the  subjects  which 
Justi  aftcrwarrl  assigned  both  to  Slaatskunst  and  to  Policey, 
i.  e.,  it  treats  "of  the  government  and  organization  [Verfasstin^'] 
of  a  lanrl  and  j^rincipality  in  sf)iritual  and  secular  aflfairs." 
The  third  part  (266  pages),  on  the  properties  and  revenues 
of  a  ruler,  corresponds  with  the  Finanzwissenschaft,  or  Cameral- 

'  The  translation  "constitution"  is  avoiflcd  because  it  carries 
associations  wliii  h  would  be  largely  anachronistic  if  referred  to  the  quasi- 
absolute  type  of  state.     Vide  p.  34  above. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SECKENDORFF  71 

wissenschaft  in  the  restricted  sense,  of  the  later  cameralists. 
Instead  of  a  fourth  part,  co-ordinate  with  the  first  three,  198 
pages  are  devoted  to  a  more  specific  scheme  of  organization, 
in  accordance  with  the  foregoing  discussion.  The  editions 
after  1664  contain  an  appendix  of  208  pages,  consisting  of 
notes  upon  various  passages  in  the  body  of  the  book. 

While  the  contents  of  Seckendorff's  system  should  be  rear- 
ranged in  another  form,  to  show  most  distinctly  their  relations 
to  cameralism  as  a  whole,  we  must  be  content  to  sketch  them 
in  brief,  so  far  as  they  are  important  for  our  purpose,  in  the 
order  in  which  they  appear  in  Der  Fursten  Stoat  and  Der 
Christen  Stoat. 

Seckendorff  begins  the  former  book  by  calling  attention  to 
the  unreliability,  for  purposes  of  precision,  of  most  previous 
attempts  to  exhibit  in  print  the  exact  conditions  of  German 
states  and  the  consequent  need  of  accurate  accounts  (pp.  30- 
32).  These  accounts  should  contain  precise  descriptions  not 
only  of  the  form  of  government  of  the  state  in  question,  the 
particular  subject  with  which  Seckendorff  proposes  to  deal, 
and  for  subsequent  treatment  of  which  he  hopes  his  book  will 
serve  as  a  model;  but  they  should  also  describe  the  external 
conditions  of  the  country,  to  which  all  rulers  and  magistrates 
must  accommodate  their  policies.  Because  the  present  book 
does  not  refer  to  a  specific  country  alone,  he  says,  it  can  offer 
on  the  latter  division  of  the  subject  only  a  tentative  (unver- 
Jangiich)  model  or  scheme  in  accordance  with  which  the  neces- 
sary description  of  the  external  conditions  of  each  country 
may  be  worked  out  (p.  33).  The  scheme  proposed  is  in  brief 
as  follows: 

First,  an  account  of  the  name,  origin,  and  circumstances  of 
the  principality;  viz.,  (a)  whence  the  designation  is  derived;   (b) ' 
how  the  sovereignty  over  this  territory  arose;   (c)  the  geographical 
and  topographical  peculiarities  of  the  territory;  (d)  the  need  of  maps 
which  shall  show  these  facts  (pp.  33-35).    Second,  an  account  of 


72  THE  CAMERALISTS 

the  subdivisions  of  the  country  and  dependencies;  i.  e.,  (a)  according 
to  natural  boundaries;  (b)  according  to  various  artificial  arrange- 
ments; (c)  the  distribution  of  the  territory  among  various  officials; 
(d)  the  subdivisions  of  magisterial  and  judicial  jurisdictions  in  the 
country;  (e)  more  specific  description  of  each  subdivision  of  the 
country  under  this  scheme;  (/)  streets,  bridges,  and  passes  (pp.  35- 
41).  Third,  an  account  of  the  qualities  and  fertility  of  the  territory; 
i.  c.,  (a)  the  fertility  of  countries  in  general;  (b)  varieties  of  produc- 
tivity of  countries;  (c)  special  topics  to  be  treated  in  the  description 
of  the  fertility  of  particular  countries  (pp.  41,  42).  Fourth,  an 
account  of  the  inhabitants  of  the  country;  viz.,  (a)  the  uncertainty 
of  the  natural  disposition  of  people;'  (b)  class  divisions  of  the  inhabit- 
ants;' (c)  somewhat  more  essential  marks  of  difFerence;^  (d)  per- 
sonal and  peculiar  qualities  of  the  sovereign*  (pp.  49,  50).  Fifth, 
a  roster  of  the  servants  of  the  ruler  and  of  the  government  (p.  50). 

If  the  present  purpose  were  to  write  a  history  of  cameralism, 
it  would  be  necessary  to  analyze  these  beginnings  of  a  tech- 

>  It  appears  that  amateur  social  psychologists  had  already  brought 
rash  generalizations  about  the  character  of  peoples  into  disrepute.  Sec- 
kendorff  demands  that  judgments  of  that  nature  shall  be  based  on  adequate 
examination  of  the  facts,  instead  of  accidental  and  fragmentary  evidence. 
He  also  points  out  that  many  characteristics  of  people  which  are  attrib- 
uted to  their  ''natural  traits"  are  due  rather  to  their  bringing  up  and 
their  food  supply  {Aufferziehung  und  Nahrung);  a  decidedly  farsighted 
paragraph  (p.  4j). 

'  The  criterion  in  mind  here  is  essentially  that  of  civic  and  eccle- 
siastical structure,  on  the  administrative  side. 

3  Here  the  reference  is  to  social  differences  which  reflect  group  inter- 
ests not  primarily  official,  but  the  analysis  suggested  is  very  crude.  It 
names  differences  of  religion,  differences  connected  with  differentiation 
of  a  learned  class,  differences  between  the  imperial  and  the  local  nobility, 
differences  between  the  status  of  burghers  in  free  cities  and  those  of  other 
cities,  etc. 

4  The  specifications  under  this  head  concern  chiefly  the  traditions 
which  hedge  afx)ut  the  succession.  They  are  of  an  entirely  different 
order,  according  to  modern  methodology,  from  those  with  which  the 
chapter  began:  i.  e.,  they  are  political,  constitutional,  legal,  not  physical. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SECKENDORFF  73 

nology,  in  order  to  trace,  first,  the  development  of  consciousness 
of  the  problems,  administrative  and  theoretical,  to  be  solved, 
and  second,  the  development  of  the  technique  for  dealing  with 
those  problems.  Our  concern,  however,  is  not  with  these 
details.  Our  object  is  to  visualize  the  relation  which  cameral- 
ism bore  to  the  problems  of  social  science  in  general.  The 
first  book  of  Der  Fursten  Stoat  has  no  bearing  upon  this  pur- 
pose beyond  its  use  in  confirming  the  theorem  that  cameralism 
was  essentially  a  phase  of  the  quasi-absolutism  which  was  the 
central  factor  in  the  machinery  of  the  social  process  in  Ger- 
many from  the  Reformation  to  the  French  Revolution.  There 
was  nothing  in  the  programme  of  description  marked  out  in 
this  book  except  the  fourth  and  fifth  categories  which  would 
not  be  equally  in  place  in  a  democratic  country.  As  it  stands 
in  Seckendorff 's  scheme,  however,  it  is  a  plan  for  taking  account 
of  the  stock  with  which  a  quasi-absolutism  has  to  do  business. 
The  second  -part  directly  addresses  the  task  of  planning 
the  administration  of  the  state,  and  it  still  more  directly  con- 
firms our  theorem  of  quasi-absolutism.  Chap,  i  deals  with 
the  government,  sovereignty  (Hoheit),  and  authority  of  ruling 
princes  in  general.^  Under  this  head  the  analysis  proceeds: 
First,  The  government  of  a  country  is  by  no  means  an  autoc- 
racy {eigenwUlige  Herrschqft).  The  distinction,  as  Secken- 
dorff saw  it,  between  an  autocracy  and  the  typical  German 

I  I  do  not  think  it  is  necessary  to  enter  into  any  of  the  constantly 
recurring  questions  about  theoretical  relations  of  the  princes  to  the  Empire. 
In  practice,  from  this  time  on,  the  titular  head  of  the  Empire  was  virtually 
only  one  of  the  most  powerful  among  the  scores  of  rival  quasi-sovereign 
princes  in  Germany,  the  ruler  of  Prussia  looming  up  more  and  more  as 
his  most  formidable  competitor.  The  political  plot,  down  indeed  to 
the  Franco-Prussian  war,  turned  in  the  first  instance  upon  the  fluctuating 
success  of  these  principal  actors  in  controlling  the  lesser  princes.  I  take  • 
the  liberty  of  using  the  term  sovereignty  in  connection  with  these  rulers 
and  states,  because  in  relation  to  their  subjects  it  was  so  nearly  an  unqual- 
ified fact  that  the  modifications  of  the  fact  through  relations  to  the  Empire 
were  relatively  trivial. 


74  THE  CAMERALISTS 

slate  of  his  time,  which  we  describe  as  a  quasi-absolutism,  may 
best  be  indicated  in  a  translation  of  his  own  words.  He  says 
(pp.  52flf.): 

In  German  lands,  God  be  praised,  wc  have  no  knowledge  of  a 
power  exercised  by  a  single  man  in  the  country,  who  regards  himself 
as  the  highest,  and  who,  with  or  without  right,  uses  the  greatest 
fwwcr  u[)on  all  the  others  for  his  profit  and  advantage,  according 
to  his  will  and  caprice  alone,  as  a  master  is  in  the  habit  of  domineering 
over  his  chattel  men  servants  and  maid  servants.  On  the  other 
hanrl  the  princely  government  in  the  German  principalities  and 
lands,  as  in  almost  every  righUy  and  wisely  ordered  Policey,  is  nothing 
else  than  the  supreme  and  highest  dominion  of  the  proi)erly  ruling 
territorial  [)rince  or  lord,  which  is  enforced  and  exercised  by  him 
over  the  estates  and  subjects  of  the  principality,  also  over  the  land 
itself  and  its  appurtenances,  for  the  maintenance  and  promotion  of 
the  common  pn)fit  and  welfare,  and  for  the  administration  of  justice. 

If  ideals  were  realities,  German  states  at  this  i)eriod  could 
not  be  classed  as  absolutistic  in  spirit  and  in  essence,  whatever 
they  were  in  form.  The  fallacy  which  it  required  the  Revolu- 
tion to  expose  was  that  this  type  of  pious  statement  of  the  pur- 
IM>ses  of  government  was  not  [)rotected  by  eflfective  safeguards 
against  the  arbitrariness  of  rulers  on  whose  talent  anrl  virtue 
the  realization  of  the  ideal  depended.  In  other  words,  the 
rulers  were  to  such  an  extent  the  final  judges  of  what  was 
involved  in  "profit  and  welfare,"  and  they  had  so  large  liberty 
to  decide  that  whatever  was  "profit  and  welfare"  for  themselves 
was  identical  with  the  good  of  the  people  and  the  state,  that 
the  regime  which  cameralism  represented  was  qualified  autoc- 
racy, from  the  modern  point  of  view.  We  shall  see  what 
some  of  the  qualifications  were,  and  we  shall  see  that  the  came- 
ralists  in  general  were  oi)pose(l  to  any  further  qualifications 
which  would  tend  to  make  the  ruler  more  responsible  to  the 
[)eople.  The  cameralists  did  much  to  raise  the  standards 
which  a  benevolent  despot  should  adopt.    They  did  virtually 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SECKEXDORFF 


/.■> 


nothing  directly  to  raise  the  standards  of  the  citizens'  rights 
to  insist  that  their  rulers  should  adopt  them.  Within  limits, 
to  be  sure,  but  with  a  scope  which  devclof)ing  civic  conscious- 
ness presently  found  intolerable,  the  princes  were  the  sole 
judges  of  what  was  good  for  their  peoples  and  states.  Cameral- 
ism was  the  technique  and  the  philosophy  of  states  in  which 
this  situation  was  taken  for  granted. 

In  the  second  place  (p.  53)  Seckendorff  brings  the  sovereignly 
of  the  prince  into  stronger  light  by  comparing  it  with  the  subjc(  t 
condition  of  everybody  else  in  the  state.  "When  we  thus  ascribe 
this  supreme  authority  to  the  person  of  the  territorial  lord  alone,  or 
thereby  set  aside  all  other  persons  in  a  country,  whom  we  have  already 
described  in  the  first  part,  although  they  also  are  empowered  with 
certain  lordship  and  authority  either  by  the  prince  himself  and  his 

ancestors,  as  well  as  by  other  foreign  governments All  these, 

however  powerful  and  rich  they  are,  in  comparison  with  the  prince, 
are  to  be  regarded  severally  and  collectively  as  mere  subjects." 

In  the  next  paragraph  (p.  54)  the  author  bases  this  doctrine  on 
(i)  the  ancient  tradition,  (2)  the  feudal  concession  of  lordship  by 
the  emperor  to  the  territorial  prince,  (3)  the  recognition  of  the 
.supreme  authority  of  the  prince  by  the  other  estates  and  subjects 
of  the  country  by  taking  the  customary  oath  of  allegiance  to  him. 

Confirmation  of  the  claim  is  found  further  (p.  56)  in  the  fact 
that  other  high  personages,  even  of  the  rank  of  count,  no  longer  use 
the  form  with  reference  to  themselves,  "by  the  grace  of  God,"  nor 
does  such  a  person  speak  or  write  of  himself  as  "we."  The  prince 
uses  that  form,  and  therewith  he  expresses  his  tenure  of  the  supreme 
governing  station,  by  the  will  of  God,  and  his  preferment  over  his 
subjects. 

On  the  other  hand,  as  previously  asserted,  the  government  of  a 
principality  consists  in  achieving  and  maintaining  the  common 
advantage  and  wcll-lx;ing,  in  spiritual  and  wordly  things  (p.  56). 
Thereupon  Seckendorff  moralizes:  "The  final  purpose  of  all  human 
actions  and  deeds  is  the  honor  of  God,  for  which  the  human  race  was 
esf)ecially  created.  Particulariy  however  is  it  seemly  for  those  high 
authorities  who  are  God's  deputies  on  earth  to  see  that  the  honor  of 


76  THE  CAMERALISTS 

their  sovereign  heavenly  overlord  is  sought    in    all    things,  etc." 

In  further  commentar>'  on  the  sacred  functions  of  the  prince, 
the  argument  continues:  "In  former  times  the  clergy  deprived  princes 
of  large  parts  of  their  sacred  prerogatives,  but  since  a  large  part 
of  Germany,  more  than  a  hundred  years  ago,  turned  to  evangelica' 
religion  by  adopting  the  Augsburg  Confession,  the  princes  have 
resumed  those  sacred  offices  which  belonged  to  them." 

In  the  third  place,  the  prerogative  of  the  prince  in  worldly  admin- 
istration may  be  specified  under  four  heads  (p.  58):  First,  in 
establishing  his  own  power  and  dignity,  so  that  he  will  be  able  to 
suppress  disorders,  and  will  have  prestige  enough  to  make  his  govern- 
ment efficient  in  gaining  its  ends;  second,  he  has  to  establish  power, 
good  laws  and  ordinances  in  the  country,  by  which  righteousness, 
peace,  and  repose,  and  the  means'  of  the  country  and  of  the  people 
will  be  brought  into  being,  and  maintained,  the  evil  punished,  and 
the  good  promoted;  third,  the  supreme  jurisdiction  in  the  country 
l>elongs  to  the  prince,  that  is,  to  pronounce  the  law  l>etween  his 
subjects  in  case  they  quarrel,  and  to  enforce  the  findings  according 
to  the  desert  of  each;  fourth,  it  is  his  duty  to  establish  and  use  all 
the  means  whereby  the  foregoing  institutions  may  be  set  in  motion 
and  administered  in  case  of  need  against  disoljedient  subjects  or 
foreign  enemies  and  aggressors. 

Chap,  ii  treats  of  the  qualification  of  the  sovereignty  of  the  prince 
by  his  relations  to  the  Empire.  In  sec.  i,  on  the  "Reichs  Hoheit" 
over  the  German  principalities,  SeckendoriT  continues  in  substance: 
"In  order  that  the  opinion  may  not  be  inferred  from  the  previous 
chapter  that  any  German  Landes-Herrschaji  is  absolutely  free,  we 
have  to  call  attention  to  the  fact  that  we  are  speaking  of  countries 
within  the  Roman  Empire  0}  the  German  Nation,  of  which  the  imjje- 
rial  majesty  is  the  supreme  head.  It  follows  that  each  German 
country  is  under  the  emperor  and  the  Empire.      This  involves  the 

'  The  word  Vermogen  is  an  extremely  loose  term  in  camcralistic  usage. 
We  shall  have  to  call  attention  to  it  frequently.  It  may  mean  "wealth," 
oftencr  it  means  wealth  plus  everything  else,  from  IxKlily  strength  to 
the  arts  and  sciences  and  a  strong  army,  which  is  a  civic  resource.  The 
robrless  term  "means"  is  therefore  chosen  as  a  rendering. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SECKENDORFF  77 

consequence  that  a  German  prince  or  Landes-IIerr  is  not  responsible 
alone  to  his  conscience  toward  God  the  Almighty  for  his  government 
and  actions,  but  that  he  is  also  under  obligations,  and  in  many  ways 
bound  by  his  sworn  duties  to  pay  the  due  respect  and  obedience  to 
the  regularly  chosen  ruling  Roman  emperor  and  to  the  Empire,  and 
to  all  that  the  imperial  majesty,  with  the  electors,  princes,  and  estates 
of  the  Empire  have  ordained  and  may  ordain"  (pp.  60,  61). 

This  section,  with  the  remainder  of  the  chapter,  is  ample 
commentary  upon  Roscher's  judgment  cited  above  (p.  62;  vide 
Roscher,  p.  243),  that  Seckendorff  was  a  champion  of  the  old 
order.  To  him  the  Empire  was  still  a  vital  reality.  There  can 
of  course  be  no  valid  interpretation  of  German  history,  not 
merely  in  the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth  centuries,  but  even 
to  the  present  moment,  which  does  not  trace  the  actual  work- 
ings of  this  survival  among  the  other  factors  which  complicated 
the  collisions  of  interests  after  the  Empire  became  more  a  theory 
than  a  fact.  It  is  as  unnecessary  for  our  present  piirpose  as 
it  would  be  impossible  to  compress  into  a  brief  formula  the 
incalculable  variety  of  modifications  which  the  increasingly 
spectral  reminiscence  called  the  Empire  wrought  upon  the 
changing  political  situations  of  the  period  in  which  cameralism 
developed.  The  most  essential  consideration  is  this:  On  the 
score  of  absolutism  there  was  no  essential  difference  for  the 
masses  between  the  graded  feudal  type  of  sovereignty  repre- 
sented by  the  Empire,  and  the  quasi-absolute  type  represented 
by  the  would-be  independent  German  princes,  with  slowly 
increasing  modifications,  down  to  the  Franco-Prussian  War. 
Democracy  made  progress  directly  or  indirectly  toward  its 
own  by  collisions  of  interests  among  which,  sometimes  for 
weal  and  sometimes  for  woe,  the  imperial  interest  was  a  factor. 
If  our  present  task  were  to  enter  upon  analysis  of  the  forces 
which  played  upon  one  another  in  Germany  from  Seckendorff 
to  Sonnenfels,  the  imperial  factor  would  constantly  be  a  mean- 
ing term  in  the  equation,  though  with  a  steadily  diminishing 


78  THE  CAMERALISTS 

coefficient.  For  our  present  purpose  the  perception  suffices 
that  however  power  and  authority  were  divided  between  princes 
and  emperor,  the  net  result  for  the  people  of  Germany  was 
quasi -absolutism  as  the  foundation  course  of  their  social  struc- 
ture. The  quarrels  between  the  shadowy  imperial  sovereign 
and  the  matter-of-fact  territorial  sovereigns,  whether  of  major 
or  minor  importance  in  their  immediate  effects  upon  the  evo- 
lution of  constitutionalism,  as  the  next  species  of  political  order 
in  Germany,  were  in  principle  negligible  from  our  present 
point  of  view.  They  were  merely  details  in  the  administration 
of  control,  which  was  quasi-absolutism,  however  it  was  dis- 
tributed. To  the  ordinary  German  citizen  the  presence  or 
absence  of  the  imperial  factor  in  the  political  situation  simply 
meant  one  privileged  player  more  or  less  in  the  game  in  which 
in  any  event  he  was  only  a  pawn.  We  may  therefore  cancel 
Seckendorff's  imperialism  from  our  calculation,  for  it  was  of 
no  significance  for  our  main  consideration,  viz.,  the  essential 
relation  of  government  to  citizens,  which  was  the  major  premise 
of  cameralism. 

For  parallel  reasons  we  need  not  concern  ourselves  with 
the  class  of  questions  which  Seckendorff  raises  in  chap,  iii,  viz., 
the  relation  of  the  prince  to  the  hereditary  or  customary  rights 
of  certain  other  persons,  particularly  agnates  of  the  princely 
house.  These  rights  may  vary  from  claim  to  petty  prerogative 
to  presumptive  share  in  the  sovereignty.  However  these  items 
are  arranged,  they  are,  as  it  were,  family  matters  among  the 
quasi-absolute  few,  and  the  political  tutelage  of  the  many 
remains  unaffected. 

In  chap,  iv  on  the  other  hand  we  come  upon  limitations 
of  quasi -sovereignty  which  were  in  the  last  analysis  of  a  more 
democratic  character.  One  of  the  most  constant  difficulties 
of  the  mo<lem  student  of  conditions  under  the  rdgime  of  "benev- 
olent despotism"  is  to  understand  how  there  can  have  been 
an  irreducible  minimum  of  law  for  the  individual  and  for 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SECKEXDORFF  79 

non-privileged  groups  which  the  quasi-autocrats  were  Ijound 
to  respect.  Of  course  the  explanation  is  that  the  equilibrium 
of  controlling  and  of  controlled  groups  at  any  moment  is  a 
resultant  of  forces  which  have  previously  passed  through  many 
other  forms  of  adjustment.  In  the  conflicts  f)f  interests  out 
of  which  German  civilization  of  the  seventeenth  century  took 
shape,  a  great  body  of  tradition  defining  the  rights  of  citizens 
had  been  accepted  as  settled.  In  the  cameralistic  period  this 
body  of  tradition  represented  a  mass  of  social  inertia,  compared 
with  which  imperial  claims  were  merely  casual  grit  in  the  j)olit- 
ical  running  gear,  while  the  prerogatives  of  territorial  princes 
were  to  a  considerable  extent  recent  acquisitions.  These  cus- 
toms, which  insured  a  great  body  of  relatively  satisfactory 
private  rights,  were  in  a  large  degree  inconsistent  with  the  auto- 
cratic type  of  sovereignty  which  the  princes  represented.  Yet 
the  customary  laws  were  often  more  firmly  established  than 
the  sovereignties,  and  whatever  the  theories  of  divine  right, 
respect  for  ancient  private  rights  was  the  price  which  the  quasi- 
absolutisms  had  to  pay  for  tenure  of  their  balance  of  power. 
The  critical  fact  in  the  quasi -absolutisms  of  this  period,  from 
our  present  point  of  view,  was  that  the  people,  in  the  modem 
sense,  had  no  initiative  in  legislation,  and  a  minimum  of  influ- 
ence upon  public  policies  which  might  at  last  decide  whether 
their  ancient  private  rights  were  worth  having.  At  the  same 
time  there  was  a  body  of  law  which  in  general  amounted  to 
much  more  of  a  real  limitation  upon  the  conceivable  autocracy 
of  the  princes,  from  the  democratic  side,  than  the  shadowy 
remainder  of  the  older  regime  exerted  from  the  imperial  side. 
In  the  passage  next  in  order  (pp.  72  ff.)  the  nature  of  these 
limitations  of  absolutism  is  briefly  indicated. 

In  the  first  place  "the  subjects  in  a  country  are  not  slaves."  The 
alternative  description  of  what  they  are  is  formulated  in  syntax  as 
cloudy  as  the  idea  which  it  attempts  to  express.  Its  substance  is 
that  "subjects  are  under  the  righteous  government  of  authorities 


8o  THK  CAMFRALISTS 

divinely  appf>inted  to  guard  the  welfare  of  iheir  bodies  and  souls 
according  to  Christian,  Godly,  natural  and  imiK-rial  law,  and  that 
they  arc  always  to  be  protected  and  cherished  by  this  government 
according  to  the  cardinal  principles  of  a  commendable  form  of  gov- 
ernment, according  to  the  circumstances  of  the  German  principali- 
ties, as  will  be  set  forth  in  the  remainder  of  the  hook." 

Thus  there  are  particular  rights  and  pf)wers  [Bejiignisse]  of  sub- 
jects which  the  ruler  is  lK)und  to  resfx-'ct,  not  merely  l>ecause  they 
are  matters  of  conscience  and  of  ultimate  accountability  to  God, 
but  IxKaiuse  of  certain  externally  binding  obligations.  For  instance, 
either  the  ruler  or  his  predecessors  may  have  promised  or  conceded 
s^jmething,  or  it  is  incumJjent  ufx^n  him  because  it  is  involved  in 
general  German  laws  and  principles,  or  it  is  in  accordance  with 
ancient  tradition.'  Thus  the  prince  must,  in  the  first  place,  have 
a  care  for  the  maintenance  of  religion,  according  to  both  custom 
and  usage  of  the  country.  In  the  second  place  the  prince  must 
listen  to  the  complaints  of  subjects  against  one  another,  and  must 
execute  justice  lx.'tween  them.  In  the  third  place  the  subjects  may 
rightfully  claim  that  the  ruler  may  not  act  in  a  tyrannical  manner 
toward  their  possessions.  In  the  fourth  place,  if  he  has  entered 
into  agreements  with  the  estates  or  subjects  of  his  land,  the  ruler 
may  not  act  contrary  to  his  promises,  without  the  consent  of  said 
estates  or  subjects.  If  it  becomes  necessary  to  change  the  traditional 
order,  as  will  often  be  the  case  in  matters  of  taxation,  it  is  proper 
that  the  ruler  should  grant  a  hearing  to  the  estates,  and  that  he  gain 
their  consent,  in  order  to  avoid  serious  complications.  Besides 
these  chief  points  there*  are  many  others,  with  reference  to  which 
the  ruler,  "although  not  from  obligation,  yet  from  praiseworthy 

«  II  should  l>e  observed  that  while  Seckendorff  prol>ably  thought 
he  was  ihus  *iefining  freedom,  from  our  angle  of  vision  he  was  simply 
drawing  the  outlines  of  qua.si-al>solutism.  The  ruler  was  relatively 
free  to  deride  for  himself  whether  and  in  what  particulars  he  would 
resper  t  these  limitations,  and  what  sp)ec  ific  a<  tions  respect  for  them 
demanded.  The  subjects  were  not  free  to  hold  him  strictly  responsible 
to  the  law,  or  to  take  part  in  making  new  laws.  They  were  thus  at  the 
mercy  of  the  caprice  of  the  prince  to  such  an  extent  that  their  ancient 
liberties  might  at  any  moment  virtually  Ix:  nullified. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SECKENDORFF  8i 

and  excellent  custom,  takes  council  with  the  estates,  and  hears  their 
loyal  opinions,  although  he  is  not  immediately  bound  thereby" 
(p.  76).' 

Chap.  V  enters  upon  analysis  of  the  secular  administration. 
The  first  theorem  is  that  the  prince  should  himself  administer  the 
weightiest  affairs  of  his  land  and  not  leave  them  to  his  servants 
(p.  84).  The  fulfilment  of  this  condition  consists  first  in  the  effort 
of  the  prince  to  obtain  a  thorough  acquaintance  with  the  circum- 
stances of  his  land  (die  eigentlichc  Beschafjenheit  seines  iMndvs 
umbstdndlich  zu  •mssen).^ 

Chap,  vi  enters  into  particulars  about  organization  of  a  chan 
cellery,  but  it  contains  nothing  that  contributes  in  principle  to  our 
inquir)'.     It  continues  the  impression  however  that  its  specifications 

'  A  general  description  of  a  Landtag  follows  (pp.  77  ff.).  The 
whole  discussion  is  typical  of  a  state  of  things  already  referred  to,  and 
to  be  emphasized  later,  viz.,  that  during  the  canieralistic  period  there 
was  growing  dctiniteness  of  opinion  about  the  things  wanted  of  govern- 
ments. Very  little  appears  in  the  writings  of  the  cameralists  to  show 
that  their  eyes  were  opening  to  the  need  of  some  reinforcement  of  these 
wants  beyond  the  irresponsil)le  will  of  the  rulers.  In  other  words,  the 
cameralists  formulated  governmental  standards  which  involved  more 
and  more  consideration  of  the  wants  of  the  people.  They  do  not  come 
out  into  the  open  with  any  theories  of  effective  sanctions  for  these  popular 
•lemands. 

»  The  context  elatwratcs  the  proposition  by  making  it  equivalent 
to  a  demand  that  the  prince  shall  know  all  that  is  in  the  programme  of 
the  (ameralisls — a  naive  way  of  reiterating  the  supreme  inif)ortance  of 
cameralism  !  The  a.stonishing  thing,  to  the  modern  mind,  in  the  elalx)ra- 
tion  of  this  theorem  is  that  its  tone  is  that  which  we  might  expect  in  a 
tutor  toward  a  prince  in  his  early  teens.  One  wonders  whether  the  author 
was  really  a<ldressing  rulers,  or  was  actually  attempting  to  make  the  reail- 
ing  public  believe  that  his  picture  of  what  a  prince  ought  to  be  was  a  cor- 
rect likeness  of  rulers  as  they  were.  One  wonders  too  whether  the  theorems 
alx>ut  the  selection  of  the  servants  of  the  prince  (pp.  8y-t;2)  could  have 
l)ecn  intended  as  exhortations.  They  are  so  axiomatic  that  no  one  at 
all  acquainted  with  government  could  be  expected  to  express  any  other 
views  for  public  consumption.  The  fact  that  they  were  usually  disre- 
garded at  will  by  the  quasi-absolute  rulers  was  a  large  part  of  the  social 
logic  which  ultimately  alwlished  absolutism. 


82  THE  CAMERALISTS 

about  the  qualifications  and  duties  of  civil  servants  constitute  a  highly 
idealized  picture  of  the  desirable,  rather  than  a  literal  analysis  of 
actual,  official  traits. 

Chap,  vii  recurs  to  the  first  cardinal  division  of  governmental 
functions'  "which  consists  in  maintaining  the  sovereign  power  and 
dignity  in  themselves"  (p.  102). 

At  this  point  we  come  upon  the  plainest  exhibition  of  that 
peculiarity  of  cameralism  which  for  the  purposes  of  this  inter- 
pretation is  fundamental.  Cameralism  posited  the  dignity 
and  power  of  the  government  as  the  foremost  consideration. 
Whether  this  is  a  tenable  position  we  are  not  now  concerned 
to  inquire.  Our  primary  object  is  to  make  plain  that,  this 
being  the  fundamental  principle  of  cameralism,  all  the  sub- 
sequent contents  of  the  system  must  be  understood  strictly 
in  their  relations  to  this  center.  If  they  are  detached  from 
this  base,  and  treated  as  though  they  were  taught  as  universals 
by  the  cameralists,  or  with  the  same  emphasis  in  relation  to 
some  other  center,  the  whole  meaning  of  cameralism  as  a 
phase  of  social  science  is  radically  misinterpreted.  Suppose 
we  say  that  Abraham  Lincoln's  "government  of  the  people, 
for  the  people,  by  the  people"  means  that  the  foremost  aim 
of  the  state  is  what  the  people  want,  because  they  want  it. 
Whether  this  would  be  a  tenable  principle  we  are  also  not  now 
concerned  to  inquire.  It  is  obvious  at  a  glance,  however, 
that  the  latter  formula  taken  as  a  major  premise  of  soial  theory 
would  tend  to  arrange  institutions  and  policies  in  a  system  very 
different  from  that  which  would  follow  from  the  cameralistic 
assumption.  The  cameralistic  principle  tended  to  exalt  gov- 
ernment to  the  rank  of  an  end  in  itself.  The  alternative  sug- 
gested would  tend  to  subordinate  government  to  the  rank 
of  a  means,  to  be  employed  in  one  way  or  another  according 
to  circumstances,  and  to  be  respected  much  or  little  in  proj)or- 
tion  to  what  it  proved  to  be  worth.     Meanwhile,  all  sorts  of 

•  Vide  aJx)ve,  p.  76. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SECKENDORFF  83 

variations  of  judgment  would  occur  between  people  who 
reasoned  from  one  and  the  other  basis,  about  almost  everything 
with  which  governments  have  to  do.  It  might  turn  out  that  from 
the  one  standpoint  it  would  appear,  in  given  circumstances, 
that  taxes  should  be  high,  armies  large,  governmental  employees 
many,  individual  initiative  distrusted,  commercial  policies 
exclusive,  etc.,  while  from  the  other  standpoint  the  opposite 
conclusions  would  be  equally  plausible.  If  we  are  intery)reting 
incidentals  of  a  theory,  it  makes  all  the  difference  in  the  world, 
therefore,  what  the  basic  presumptions  of  the  theory  are. 

Roscher  taught  his  generation  to  interpret  the  cameralists 
as  economists,  or  at  least  English-speaking  readers  and  imita- 
tors have  understood  him  so  to  teach.  As  we  have  said  above,' 
that  interpretation  is  a  cardinal  error.  The  cameralists  were 
primarily  political  scientists,  and  with  a  theory  which  pre- 
judged economic  questions  that  had  not  yet  arisen  in  abstract 
form,  but  which  came  later  into  the  center  of  debate.  The 
judgments  which  the  cameralists  passed  on  such  matters  as 
population,  money,  taxes,  trade,  were  dictated  by  the  particu- 
lar type  of  political  preconception  which  they  adopted.  That 
is,  they  were  estimates  of  political  expediency  under  certain 
assumed  conditions,  among  them  being  the  presumption  of 
the  paramount  worth  of  the  government  and  its  incarnation, 
the  ruler.  These  cameralistic  judgments  were  not  passed 
upon  economic  questions  in  the  shape  in  which  they  arose 
when  economic  problems  were  abstracted  and  generalized, 
instead  of  being  treated  as  details  subordinate  to  political  pre- 
conceptions. In  so  far  as  we  find  economic  theory  in  the 
cameralistic  systems  at  all,  therefore,  we  have  to  understand  it 
as  virtually  an  answer  to  the  question,  What,  in  the  given  case, 
best  promotes  the  purposes  of  the  quasi-absolutism  which  is  the 
main  consideration  ?  Whether  the  cameralists  judged  sanely 
on  that  question  or  not,  the  answer  was  not  intended  by  them 

»  Vide  Preface,  p.  xiii. 


84  THE  CAMERALISTS 

to  fit  the  primarily  economic  questions  which  were  later 
raised ;  and  it  is  a  historical  fallacy  to  summon  them  as  witnesses 
on  questions  which  never  came  within  the  range  of  their 
reckoning. 

The  chapter  (vii)  in  which  maintenance  of  the  sovereign 
power  and  dignity  is  discussed  occupies,  with  its  prefixed 
summary,  eighty-two  pages.  This  is  a  natural  and  propor- 
tional allotment  of  space  to  correspond  with  the  prominence 
which  the  theory  assigns  to  the  subject.  It  is  altogether  incon- 
sistent with  the  supposition  that  the  book  was  attempting  to 
frame  a  social  theory  in  which  economic  problems,  as  under- 
stood since  Adam  Smith,  should  receive  due  attention.  We 
need  to  notice  the  chapter  only  enough  to  illustrate  what  we 
have  said  about  its  character  as  a  symptom  of  partiality  for 
a  type  of  political  structure. 

In  the  first  place,  the  chapter  deals  very  largely  with  details 
which  a  modem  democrat  would  lightly  waive  aside  as  mere  matters 
of  ceremonial,  and  good  form.  On  the  other  hand,  the  first  impor- 
tant stipulation  is  of  another  kind,  viz.,  that  the  prince  must  annually 
verify  the  boundary  lines  of  his  territories  to  make  sure  that  his 
neighbors  are  not  encroaching  (p.  1 16) ;  and  the  next  follows  natu- 
rally, viz.,  that  as  a  last  resort  force  must  be  used  to  end  the  aggression 
(p.  117).  The  specifications  under  the  head  of  protection  of  the 
princely  dignity  with  respect  to  the  emperor  (pp.  119  S.)  are  largely 
ceremonial  pedantries,  but  if  they  pertain  to  matters  of  importance 
they  touch  the  location  of  authority,  not  the  principle  of  authority 
itself;  that  is,  they  refer  to  balance  between  the  imperial  and  the 
princely  prerogative.  The  insistence  (p.  123)  upon  stickling  about 
the  terms  of  treaties,  hereditary  dispositions,  primogeniture,  etc., 
betrays  systematic  cultivation  of  princely  self-consciousness,  more 
than  care  for  more  important  interests  which  might  be  endangered 
by  laxness  about  precedents  and  technicalities.  Specification  of  the 
regalia,  the  revenues,  etc.,  would  belong  under  this  head  in  any 
system  which  made  room  for  government  at  all,  and  SeckendorflPs 
treatment  of  them  here  is  in  no  respect  peculiar.    The  political  type 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SECKENDORFF  85 

for  which  he  spoke  becomes  conspicuous,  however,  when  he  turns 
lo  the  means  which  must  be  used  to  maintain  the  person  and  dignity 
of  the  prince  himself  (pp.  129  fT.).  The  safety  and  comfort  of  the 
chief  magistrate  will  always  be  of  importance  in  a  civilized  state 
but  Seckendorflf  raises  details  of  the  most  trifling  sort,  like  matters 
of  [)etty  etiquette,  or  the  kinds  of  amusements  proper  to  the  prince, 
to  a  degree  of  prominence  which  would  be  possible  only  under  arbi- 
trary preconceptions  about  the  relative  values  of  political  persons 
(e.  g.,  pp.  175  ff.).  Parts  of  the  chapter  are  prolegomena  to  a  plan 
of  mental  and  moral  education  for  young  princes  (e.  g.,  pp.  136,  137, 
and  138-164).  No  doubt  all  this  is  pertinent  to  the  author's  purpose, 
but  the  pathos  of  it  is  that  it  is  exhortation  to  which  no  power  in  the 
state  was  supix)sed  to  be  justified  in  compelling  the  prince  to  listen. 
Other  parts  of  the  chapter  (e.  g.,  pp.  135,  136)  are  appeals  to  the 
piety  of  the  prince,  and  rather  broad  hints  that  if  his  intelligence  is 
not  equal  to  his  responsibilities,  he  may  by  prayer  and  consultation 
with  wise  advisers  obtain  from  God  the  necessary  guidance.  This 
is  also  very  sound  advice  under  the  circumstances,  but  it  all  empha- 
sizes the  crucial  presumption  that  government  by  a  prince  relatively 
irresponsible  to  his  subjects  must  be  taken  for  granted.  The  prin- 
ciples and  policies  and  working  rules  of  such  a  government  were  the 
matter  in  hand.  No  question  was  admitted  which  would  go  behind 
this  presupposition  of  the  divine  right  of  such  a  type  of  government 
and  ruler.  All  the  subdivisions  of  the  cameralistic  system  turned 
around  this  primary  reservation. 

Nothing  in  this  interpretation  of  Seckendorff  is  a  reflection 
upon  the  loftiness  of  his  views  or  upon  their  value  as  a  formu- 
lation of  the  ideals  which  might  make  benevolent  despotism 
tolerable.  On  the  contrary  his  theory  was  on  a  plane  so  high 
that  a  modern  reader  is  bound  to  suspect  him  of  secreting 
between  the  lines  of  his  treatise  conclusions  which  he  does  not 
state.  One  can  hardly  doubt  that  these  conventional  formu- 
lations, whether  intentionally  or  not,  actually  were  elements 
of  the  social  dynamics  steadily  making  for  more  equitable 
distribution  of  political  power.  On  the  surface,  however,  no 
hint  of  the  moral  appears  that  if  princes  do  not  observe  these 


86  THE  CAMERALISTS 

counsels  of  righteousness  and  prudence  their  occupation  will 
presently  be  gone.  Whether  or  not  such  men  as  Seckcndorff 
and  Justi,  not  to  say  Sonnenfels,  had  any  premonition  of  the 
lest  awaiting  quasi-absolutism,  their  high  ideals  of  government, 
and  of  the  character  which  rulers  should  maintain,  must  have 
been  factors  in  shary)ening  the  ])erception  of  citizens  that  the 
reality  was  too  often  in  glaring  contrast  with  the  standard. 
The  cameralists  must  thus  be  scheduled  as  among  the  factors 
which  contributed  indirectly  to  the  political  rcconstnictions 
«)f  the  nineteenth  century.  Our  present  business,  however, 
is  to  show  just  what  cameralism  was,  in  theory  and  in  practice, 
in  order  to  find  the  ex[)lanation  of  the  changes  in  theory  and 
in  i)ractice  which  impended.  In  a  word,  the  best  elements 
in  the  camcralistic  theory  were  essentials  of  good  government 
for  which  the  system  of  quasi-absolutism  furnished  no  suffi- 
cient guarantee.  A  reversal  of  the  camcralistic  y)resumptions 
was  therefore  inevitable.  Instead  of  starting  with  the  para- 
mount value  of  the  quasi-absolutislic  type  of  government,  and 
making  political  and  social  theory  a  technique  of  maintaining 
it,  post-cameralistic  philosophy  posited  certain  popular  pur- 
poses as  paramount,  and  then  proceeded  to  adopt  the  govern- 
mental means  by  which  their  ends  might  be  attained. 

Chap,  viii  ai)pr<)aches  the  classes  of  subjects  which  for  the 
nuKlern  mind  must  be  central  and  essential  in  j)olitical  prin- 
ciples and  programmes,  viz.,  "the  establishment  of  good  order 
and  laws  for  the  welfare  and  common  Vjcnefit  of  the  Father- 
land." ( Vide  above,  p.  76.)  That  is,  Seckcndorff  is  now  occupy- 
ing the  standi)oint  indicated  by  the  preamble  of  the  Constitution 
of  the  United  States.  In  this  chapter  he  begins  to  outline  the 
things  which  in  his  judgment  would  make  for  ends  correspond- 
ing with  the  later  specifications,  "form  a  more  y)erfect  union, 
establish  ju.stice,  insure  domestic  tranquillity,  [)rovide  for  the 
common  defense,  promcjte  the  general  welfare,  and  secure  the 
blessings  of  liberty  to  ourselves  and  our  posterity."    The 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SECKENDORFF  87 

essential  difference  in  the  two  situations  was  that  cameralism 
gave  hostages  to  quasi-absolutism  before  it  entered  upon  this 
division  of  the  inquiry.  Its  answer,  therefore,  was  foreordained 
to  be  in  terms  of  the  interests  of  the  type  of  government  assumed 
as  paramount;  while  the  American  constitution-makers  ima- 
gined themselves  free  from  all  political  preconceptions;  they 
supposed  they  were  judging  questions  of  popular  welfare  upon 
their  merits,  and  they  believed  that  they  were  acting  upon  the 
principle  of  framing  political  institutions  solely  for  their  prob- 
able utililty  as  means  to  popular  ends.  However  actual  bias 
may  have  vitiated  the  American  presumption  of  political 
impartiality,  there  was  a  distinct  contrast  in  principle  between 
the  republican  attitude  and  that  of  the  cameralists.  The 
latter,  as  we  have  said,  formulated  their  problem  as  principally 
a  question  of  the  welfare  of  the  preordained  quasi-absolutism, 
thus  at  the  outset  making  the  government  primary  and  the 
people  secondary.  The  latter  formulated  their  problem  as  a 
question  of  the  welfare  of  presumably  equal  citizens,  thus  at 
the  outset  making  the  people  primary  and  the  government 
secondary.  Only  so  far  as  the  welfare  of  equal  citizens  and 
the  welfare  of  quasi-absolute  governments  involve  identical 
relations  could  correspondence  be  expected  between  systems 
starting  from  such  contradictory  principles. 

Because  our  inquiry  makes  the  history  of  administrative 
technique  merely  incidental,  our  plan  does  not  require  analysis 
of  SeckendorfT's  cameralism  on  its  administrative  side.  We 
are  trying  to  discover  the  relation  of  the  cameralists  to  general 
problems  of  social  science.  In  so  far  as  Justi  proves  to  be 
representative  of  the  cameralists,  his  system  will  presently 
be  exhibited  in  considerable  detail,  as  typical  in  spirit  and 
purpose,  while  at  the  same  time  more  highly  elaborated  in 
structure  than  the  schemes  of  his  predecessors. 

Seckendorff  begins  his  outline  of  the  governmental  pro- 
cesses by  which  the  peace  and  prosperity  of  the  land  are  to 


88  THE  CAMERALISTS 

be  promoted,  by  repeating  that  "the  power  and  authority  to 
establish  such  ordinances  pertains  to  the  territorial  lord  and 
ruler  alone,  and  it  is  his  duty  to  promote  them  according  to 
his  best  understanding  and  knowledge"  (p.  192).  At  the  same 
time  he  declares  (p.  193)"  "The  object  of  such  ordinances  in 
general  is  that  by  means  of  them  justice,  peace  and  prosperity 
[Auffnehmen],  or  the  welfare  of  the  land  and  of  the  people, 
may  be  sought." 

We  shall  have  occasion  frequently  to  point  out  that,  during 
this  quasi-absolutistic  period,  inchoate  ideas  of  popular  welfare 
were  expressed  side  by  side  with  formulas  of  the  paramount 
importance  of  the  government.  The  solution  of  the  problems 
of  adjustment  thus  presented  is  simply  this:  In  effect,  the  ideas 
of  the  primacy  of  governmental  and  dynastic  interests  pre- 
vailed until  the  democratic  period  changed  the  balance.  Pre- 
vious to  the  democratic  revolutions,  popular  welfare  was 
always  construed,  in  case  of  conflict,  as  a  phase  of  governmen- 
tal welfare.  Meanwhile  expression  of  popular  interests  in 
more  and  more  distinct  form  must  have  weakened  the  force 
of  the  governmental  presumption  long  before  the  consequences 
of  the  change  were  visible  in  more  democratic  institutions. 

In  general  Seckendorff  represents  the  perspective  of  political 
desirability  as  follows: 

Peace,  or  the  internal  concord  of  the  country,  and  security  against 
encnnics,  arc  the  consequence  of  justice,  and  this  in  turn  will  be 
promoted  by  peace  and  concord,  so  that  it  is  true,  according  to  the 
teaching  of  King  David,  that  the  two  kiss  each  other,  and  the  one 
without  the  other  does  not  exist.  Finally,  prosperity  and  welfare 
arc  established  chiefly  upon  these  two  precious  gifts  of  God,  but 
they  are  manifest  especially  in  abundant  sustenance  and  growth  of 
the  number  of  the  p)eople,  and  in  their  means,  conduct  and  manners. 
The  supreme  purpose  (sic)  of  all  these  is  the  salutary  maintenance 
of  the  Policey  or  of  the  whole  government,  in  its  honor,  power  and 
sovereignty,  and  the  last  aim  is  the  honor  of  God,  as  we  have  else- 
where shown  (p.  193). 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SECKEXDORFF  89 

Accordingly  Seckendorflf  regards  it  as  the  task  of  govern- 
ment, and  so  of  cameralism,  to  provide  an  organization  and 
a  technique  which  will  not  only  secure  peace  and  order,  but 
the  good  morals  of  the  citizens  (p.  195).  An  extended  discus- 
sion follows  of  details  in  which  the  state,  partly  through  the 
secular  administration,  partly  through  the  ecclesiastical  and 
educational  system,  must  curb  vice  and  plant  the  seeds  of 
virtue  in  the  people. 

If  it  were  a  part  of  our  purpose  to  weigh  the  merits  and 
defects  of  quasi-absolutism  or  paternalism  as  compared  with 
democracy,  this  might  be  the  proper  point  for  undertaking 
the  process.  Instead  of  that,  the  occasion  may  be  taken  for 
a  single  remark  by  way  of  caution  and  qualification,  viz. :  Our 
constant  appeal  to  democracy  in  contrast  vdth  paternalism 
does  not  imply  disregard  for  the  historic  mission  of  paternalism. 
Certain  national  groups  have  reached  a  stage  of  development 
after  which  persistence  of  paternalism  would  have  involved 
arrest  of  progress.  Other  groups  have  at  the  same  time  pro- 
gressed more  securely  and  rapidly  under  the  guidance  of  pater- 
nalism than  would  have  been  probable  or  perhaps  possible 
with  any  other  form  of  control.  German  populations  in  the 
seventeenth  and  eighteenth  centuries  were  unquestionably 
illustrations  of  the  latter  situation.  We  are  not  impeaching 
German  quasi-absolutism  in  its  character  as  a  stage  of  evolu- 
tion. We  are  trying  to  expose  its  fallacy  when  proposed  as 
an  a-priori  principle. 

Resuming  the  problem  of  securing  peace  and  concord,  Secken- 
dorflf indicates  as  means  thereto  (pp.  201  ff.) :  good  organization  of 
justice  and  the  use  of  wholesome  laws;  (2)  strict  prohibition  of 
self-enforcement  of  suppressed  rights;  (3)  good  organization  and 
readiness  for  action  of  the  personnel  of  civic  control. 

On  the  means  of  guarding  the  health  and  increasing  the  numbers 
of  the  people,  Seckendorflf  indicates  a  governmental  programme 
extending  from  the  maintenance  of  midwives  and  nurses,  the  support 


<)0  THE  CAMERALISTS 

of  orplians,  the  suhsidizinK  of  physicians  and  surgeons,'  to  inspection 
of  foods,  of  water  supplies,  measures  for  cleaning  and  draining 
towns,  etc. 

I*assing  to  problems  of  securing  to  the  people  means  of  su])|X)rt, 
SeckcndorlT's  programme  includes  (pp.  204(1.):  (i)  the  intention 
on  the  j)art  of  government  that  no  subject  shall  lack  means  of  secur- 
ing the  necessities  of  life,  "except  as  a  special  punishment  and  provi- 
dcnrc-  of  God,  or  by  his  own  fault;"  (2)  that  the  surplus  or  special 
products  of  the  country  shall  be  specially  conserved  as  a  means  of 
sc-curing  in  exchange  from  other  countries  their  necessary  and  useful 
products.  Details  under  this  programme  are  scheduled  to  the  num- 
JK-r  of  twelve,  viz.,  (i)  the  fundamental  provision,  i.  e.,  the  good 
education  of  youth;  (2)  adequate  ordering  of  all  means  of  making 
the  land  yield  support;'  (3)  special  attention  to  those  goods  which 
are  most  generally  necessary,  i.e.,  the  products  of  the  field,  of  graz- 
ing, of  forestry,  of  the  iron,  spinning,  weaving,  and  wool  trades; 
(4)  propfjrtional  attention  to  the  more  vulgar  occupations,  i.  e.,  of 
day-laborers  and  common  servants;  (5)  ordinances  regulating  prices; 
(6)  abolition  of  usury;  (7)  regulation  of  weights  and  measures;  (8) 
certain  classes  of  sumptuary  laws,  i.  e.,  feasting  and  celebration; 
(9)  other  types  of  sumptuar>- laws,  i.  e.,  clothing,  etc. ;  (10)  discourage- 
ment of  use  of  foreign  wares  as  clothing  and  food;  (11)  suppression 
of  various  classes  of  parasites,  e.  g  ,  gamblers,  fakirs,  fraudulent 
bankrupts,  etc.;  (12)  just  management  of  income-producing  prop- 
erties belonging  to  communities. 

Thereufx>n  follows  a  similar  outline,  under  five  heads,  of  measures 
to  \)Q  employed  in  getting  the  most  advantage  from  a  country's 
sur[)lus  products,  viz.  (pp.  214  fT.):  (i)  Special  account  is  to  be 
made  of  the  peculiar  products  of  the  country,  and  special  provision 
made  for  their  encouragement;  (2)  the  influences  of  government 
must  \yc  exerted  to  maintain  the  zeal  of  the  people  for  continuing 
these  specially  advantageous  occupations;    (3)  encouragement  must 

•  The  use  of  the  word  Balhierer  tells  Its  own  story  of  the  degree  ot 
differentiation  whirh  the  professions  had  then  attained. 

»  The  section  suggests  a  curiously  unassorted  mixture  of  physical 
and  moral  devices,  from  compulsion  of  each  industrial  class  to  stick  to 
its  traditional  occupations,  to  moral  discipline  of  apprentices  and  artisans. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SECKENDORFF  91 

be  given  to  traders  from  other  countries  to  purchase  these  goods; 
(4)  special  attention  must  be  given  to  regulation  of  subjects  who 
want  to  carr)'  on  foreign  trade  in  these  goods;  (5)  the  people  must 
be  protected  by  regulation  of  domestic  trade  against  various  kinds 
of  fraud. 

In  these  two  series  of  categories  we  have  in  embryo  the 
Police ywissenschaft  worked  out  in  so  much  greater  detail,  and 
with  so  much  more  orderly  arrangement,  by  a  succession  of 
writers  up  to  Justi.  Seckendorfif's  schedules  call  for  two 
comments  only:  first,  they  show  farseeing  discernment  of 
factors  which  must  always  be  rather  elementary  in  the  pros- 
perity of  communities;  second,  they  are  crude  judgments  about 
wise  ways  and  means  for  securing  these  desirable  details.  In 
other  words,  Seckendorff's  technology  was  a  collection  of  very 
premature  conclusions  about  social  causes  and  effects.  The 
^situations  to  which  such  judgments  were  supposed  to  apply 
had  not  been  generalized,  and  the  validity  of  these  rough  and 
ready  judgments  had  not  been  adequately  tested.  That  is, 
Seckendorff's  embryonic  Policeywissenschaft,  from  the  view- 
point of  our  present  analysis,  was  merely  a  collection  of  pro- 
visional working  rules,  one  effect  of  which  was  presently  (ixi 
the  time  of  Adam  Smith)  to  produce  an  effective  demand  for 
radical  reconsideration  of  the  presuppositions  on  which  govern- 
mental relations  to  all  economic  activities  had  been  based. 
In  comparison  with  Justi,  Seckendorff  formulated  these  rules 
in  a  very  loose  fashion.  They  reflected  the  fundamental  poli- 
cies of  quasi-absolutism  plainly  enough,  however,  and  progress 
in  systematizing  these  policies  merely  intensified  their  abso- 
lutistic  character. 

Chap,  ix  (pp.  218-39)  deals  with  the  organization  of  the 
courts.  There  is  no  question  of  principle  between  quasi- 
absolutistic  and  democratic  theories  of  government,  as  to  the 
fundamental  conception  that  the  government  must  administer 
justice.     In  this  respect  there  is  nothing  peculiar  to  cameralis- 


92  THE  CAMERALISTS 

lies  which  calls  for  our  attention.  If  we  were  making  a  study 
of  comparative  juridical  institutions,  the  systems  of  courts  in 
Germany  during  the  cameralistic  period  would  of  course  occupy 
an  important  subdivision  of  the  treatment.  The  puq>oses  of 
this  book  neither  require  nor  permit  an  attempt  to  consider 
thai  branch  of  German  administration. 

F'or  similar  reas(jns  we  may  neglect  chap,  x  (pp.  240-59), 
which  deals  very  summarily  with  the  means  of  executing  the 
decrees  of  courts  and  with  the  war  powers  of  governments. 
Chaps,  xi-xiv  (pp.  260-328)  deal  with  the  general  subject  of 
the  relation  of  the  ruler  to  ecclesiastical  administration,  under 
which  rubric  educational  administration  is  included.  Here 
again  details  are  not  material  for  our  purj>ose.  We  may  observe 
that,  so  far  as  space  is  an  index,  Seckendorfl  makes  these  sub- 
jects six  times  more  prominent  in  his  general  the<jr>'  of  the  state 
than  Justi  does  in  the  same  connection.'  This  dilTerence 
I)robably  corresponds  with  the  emphasis  actually  placed  by 
the  two  men  upon  the  ecclesiastical  side  of  government.  Sec- 
kendorff  appears  to  have  had  no  doubts  whatever  that  the 
divine  order  of  the  universe  necessarily  worked  through  divinely 
ordained  princes,  in  whom  secular  and  religious  prerogatives 
were  indissoluble.  Justi  had  no  other  views  for  publication. 
He  accepted  the  ecclesiastical  organization  as  he  found  it,  and 
though  he  expressed  a  good  deal  of  contempt  for  some  of  its 
workings  he  did  not  venture  to  offer  a  theory  of  its  place  in 
the  governmental  scheme  essentially  different  from  that  assigned 
to  it  by  Seckendorff. 

Reference  to  the  Table  of  Contents  and  comparison  of 
Parts  III  and  IV  with  the  corresponding  portions  of  Justi's 
system'  will  afford  all  the  evidence  it  falls  within  our  purpose 
to  cite  about  the  place  of  Seckendorff  in  the  development  of 
the  technique  of  the  subject.     We  may  pass,  then,  from  this 

>  Vide  the  corresponding  passage  in  Slaatswissenschaft,  i.  e.,  pp. 
122-32. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SECKENDORFF  93 

outline  of  the  more  important  of  his  two  books  to  a  brief  analy- 
sis of  Der  Christen  Slat. 

Our  account  of  Scckendorff  would  be  incomplete  without 
examination  of  the  version  of  his  views  published  thirty  years 
later  than  the  volume  just  described.  This  book  would  be 
more  properly  classified  primarily  as  a  religious  exhortation 
than  as  a  political  treatise.  Since  the  relations  between  relij^ion 
and  politics  were  more  in  evidence  at  the  time  of  its  composition 
than  they  are  at  present,  more  may  be  learned  from  a  disquisi- 
tion of  this  type,  about  the  shadings  of  contemporary  i)olitical 
doctrines,  than  could  safely  be  inferred  from  a  similar  book 
today.  So  far  as  possible,  we  shall  confine  our  notice  to  cer- 
tain features  of  the  book  which  throw  light  upon  the  author's 
cameralistic  theories.* 

An  incidental  touch  in  the  dedication,  all  the  more  signifi- 
cant because  it  was  casual,  yet  at  the  same  time  conventional, 
was  the  assumption  that  the  descendants  of  the  prince  to  whom 
the  book  was  dedicated  would  continue  to  exercise  his  pre- 
rogatives "to  the  end  of  the  world."  If  there  was  any  specu- 
lation in  the  mind  of  cameralistic  authors  to  the  effect  that  the 
structures  of  states  might  be  changed  in  the  course  of  time, 
such  vain  imaginings  were  kept  below  the  surface.     The  strong 

'  The  litle-page  reads:  Herrn  Veil  Ludwig's  von  Seckendorff  Chris- 
ten-Stal.  In  Drey  Bucher  abgetheilet.  Im  Ersten  wird  von  dem  Chris- 
tenthum  an  sich  selbst,  und  dessen  Behauptung,  wider  die  Atheisten  und 
dergleichen  Leute;  Im  Anderen  von  der  Verbesserung  des  Weltlicheu, 
und  Im  Dritten  des  Ceistlichen  Standes,  nach  dem  Zweck  des  Christen- 
thums  gehandelt.  Darbey  unterschiedliche  merckliche  Stellen,  aus  alien 
und  neuen  Autoribus,  in  besonderen  Additionen  zur  Bekriiftigung  und 
Nachdencken  angehdngt  zu  befinden.  Leipzig,  verlegts.  Joh.  Friedrich 
Gleditsch.  M.DC.XCIII.  This  second  edition  (first  dated  April  18, 
1685)  is  the  only  one  that  I  have  seen.  It  is  apparently  a  reprint  of  the 
first,  without  change.  Nothing  appears  in  it  to  show  whether  it  was 
given  to  the  printer  by  the  author,  or  by  an  editor  after  his  death.  The 
body  of  the  book,  after  a  dedication,  preface,  etc..  occupying  38  pages, 
consists  of  719  pages.     The  Additiones  and   Index  occupy  570  pages. 


94  THE  CAMERALTSTS 

probability  is,  in  Seckcndorff's  case  at  least,  that  no  such  fancy- 
had  ever  disturbed  conventional  rellections. 

The  Preface  recites  that,  twenty  years  earlier,  when  the 
author  was  in  service  at  the  court  of  Moritz  of  Saxony,  that 
prince,  his  consort,  and  some  of  the  younger  members  of  the 
family  were  greatly  disturbed  by  symptoms  of  "atheism" 
among  persons  who  were  regular  or  occasional  visitors  at  court. 
The  impulse  of  Pascal's  writings  led  Seckendorff  to  attempt 
a  refutation  of  atheism,  and  this  constitutes  the  substance  of 
the  first  part  of  the  present  book.  As  the  author  describes  this 
portion  of  his  work,  it  was  purely  theoretical.  It  found  such 
a  favorable  reception  at  court,  however,  that  he  was  encouraged 
to  expand  it,  and  especially  to  show  "how  the  many  and  great 
evils  in  all  classes  were  best  to  be  remedied,  if  the  ground  of 
Godliness  were  rightly  considered,  and  its  chief  aim  were  kept 
in  sight  as  the  guide  of  all  human  actions."  In  order  to  carry 
out  this  idea,  "the  three  so-called  chief  strata  [Haupt-Stdnde] 
and  their  doings"  were  taken  into  particular  consideration, 
with  especial  reference  to  the  requirements  of  Christianity 
upon  them.  While  this  reflection  was  still  in  progress  (1681) 
the  death  of  the  elector  so  changed  the  situation  that  the  author 
was  able  to  retire  and  give  more  time  to  writing.  He  mentions 
Philipp  Jac<jb  Si)ener  of  Franckfurt  as  among  those  who  read 
parts  of  his  manuscript  and  made  useful  suggestions.  The 
pains  which  he  takes  to  excuse  the  failings  of  the  book,  on  the 
ground  that  he  had  always  been  a  man  of  affairs  and  not  a 
.scholar,  savor  more  of  vanity  than  of  modesty.  They  affect 
one  as  the  pettiness  of  an  amateur  who  was  not  too  zealous 
about  the  substance  of  his  message  to  be  fussy  about  the  impres- 
sion he  wouM  make  with  respect  to  immaterial  details  of  form. 

The  first  book  of  Der  ChrisUn-Stat  contains  nothing  which 
need  occu[)y  our  attention.'     It  is  simply  a  layman's  apolo- 

»  The  reasons  are  obvious  from  the  title,  viz..  Das  Erste  Buck,  Von 
dem  Ckrislenthum  an  sich  selhst,  wie  es  wider  die  Atheisten,  Deisten  und 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SIXKFXDORFF  95 

getic  for  religion  as  formulated  in  the  Augsburg  Confession. 
Seckemlorff  stales  in  his  Preface  lliul  belief  in  this  body  of 
doctrine  was  handed  down  to  him  from  ancestors  who  gave 
their  adherence  to  it  during  the  lifetime  of  Luther.  It  has  its 
chief  interest  not  as  an  interpretation  of  Lutheranism.  For 
that  we  should  go  to  the  theologians.  It  has  merely  a  second- 
ary value  as  a  statesman's  attempt  to  commend  Lutheranism 
primarily  to  men  of  his  own  class.  It  is  a  document  of  more 
significance  for  the  religious  than  for  the  cameralistic  side  of 
German  experience. ' 

The  second  book  sets  forth  the  ways  in  which  true  religion, 
as  exjiounded  in  the  previous  book,  should  be  apy^lied  in  the 
reform  of  civic  conduct.'  SeckendorfT  recurs  to  a  division  of 
citizens  which  he  often  employs,  viz.,  the  spiritual,  the  secular, 
and  the  domestic  strata. '  He  admits  that  in  a  way  the  third 
of  these  strata  includes  the  others.  For  this  reason  he  discusses 
it  first. 

Heuchler,  durch  dusserliche  Griinde  zu  behaupten,  und  worinnen  es  inge- 
mein  hestehe.  Of  course  this  whole  theological  background  must  have 
its  full  reckoning  in  a  calculus  of  the  various  social  factors  of  the  period. 
It  must  be  kept  in  mind  as  the  ultimate  sanction  to  which  the  principles 
of  statecraft  were  referred  by  the  cameralists  in  Lutheran  states,  as  a 
parallel  sanction  was  appealed  to  in  states  which  adopted  other  confes- 
sions;.    We  simply  cannot  consider  it  here  in  detail. 

'  Among  the  curiosities  of  this  chapter  is  an  argument  for  the  exist- 
ence of  God  based  on  an  ad  hominem  appeal  to  the  current  belief  in  the 
existence  of  ghosts.  "Whosoever  admits  the  existence  of  spirits,  must 
also  admit  God  as  the  supreme  and  highest  spirit."  The  plausibility 
of  the  argument  was  also  derived  in  part  from  the  double  meaning  of 
the  word  Geist. 

*  Das  A  ndere  Buck,  Von  der  Verbesserung  der  Sidnde  nach  detn 
(]rund  des  Christenthums  und  dessen  Haupt-Zwecks,  nemlich  der  wahren 
und  ewigen  Gliickseligkeit,  insonderheit  aber  von  Verbesserung  des  Haus- 
Slandes,  wie  auch  des  weltlichen  Regiments. 

3  "Den  Geistlichen,  Weltlichen  und  Haus-Stand."  The  problem 
which  the  word  "Stand"  in  this  sense  always  presents  to  the  English 
translator  is  only  partially  solved  by  the  rendering  "stratum." 


96  THE  CAMERALISTS 

He  distinctly  formulates  the  purpose  of  this  second  book 
in  this  way:  "To  show  that  all  strata  would  be  most  surely 
reformed  according  to  the  rule  of  Christianity  and  its  chief 
purpose."  His  initial  aim  is  to  show  that  if  this  reform  should 
first  take  place  in  domestic  life  it  would  make  all  other  civic 
improvement  easier. 

The  argument  proceeds  from  this  premise  (p.  i88) : 

The  happiness  of  the  domestic  stratum,  or  of  each  separate  human 
being,  regardless  of  accidental  social  status,  is  to  be  sought  approxi- 
mately in  this,  that  one  may  have  health,  food,  clothing,  and  other 
comforts  and  necessities  of  life;  then  further,  according  to  circum- 
stances of  age  and  time,  that  he  may  marry  well,  beget  children, 
live  long,  and  come  to  no  exceptional  end.  To  this  must  be  added 
the  common  civic  well-being  [biirgerliche  Wolfarth],  the  freedom  or 
right  to  associate  with  his  own,  to  be  thereby  in  appropriate  respect 
or  honor,  also  to  enjoy  peace  and  protection  against  wrong  and 
violence. 

One  is  reminded  that  certain  familiar  traits  of  human  nature 
are  not  modem  inventions,  by  a  reflection  which  follows  this 
schedule,  viz.: 

Most  people  seek  to  fix  the  blame  and  to  locate  the  cause  of  evils 
and  misfortunes  at  the  wrong  point.  Each  is  more  ready  to  blame 
another  than  himself.  Hence  arise  envy,  hatred,  hostility,  resistance 
and  embitterment  against  those  who  live  in  better  fortune,  especially 
against  government. 

All  sorts  of  impotent  complaints,  the  author  adds,  are 
accordingly  lodged  against  rulers,  and  at  last  against  God, 
while  people  ought  rather  to  ask  themselves  whether  they  are 
themselves  in  any  way  the  authors  of  their  own  troubles. 
Then  follows  homely  exhortation,  in  the  name  of  religion,  to 
observe  commonplace  rules  of  prudence  in  connection  with 
body  and  estate.  These  rules  are  urged  as  having  a  f)eculiarly 
Christian  content  and  force,  to  be  sure,  but  that  fact  does  not 
afifect  the  essential  purport  and  tendency  of  the  argument. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SECKENDORFF  97 

The  fundamental  prudence  of  good  bodily  habits,  of  temper- 
ance, of  frugality,  are  presented  in  their  proper  relations  lo 
subsequent  conditions  of  happiness. 

Then  follows  an  equally  judicious  chapter  on  the  domestic 
virtues.  With  mere  changes  of  detail  in  the  illustrations,  it 
would  serve  fairly  well  as  the  syllabus  of  a  lecture,  or  indeed 
of  a  series  of  lectures,  in  a  modem  sociological  course  on  the 
family. 

The  argument  then  passes  to  the  second  of  the  "strata," 
but  it  would  be  more  in  accordance  with  later  usage  to  say 
that  the  rest  of  the  book  amounts  to  a  treatise  on  practical 
Christian  ethics  in  the  social  as  distinguished  from  the  individ- 
ual phases  of  conduct,  and  of  course  with  the  theology  of  the 
Augsburg  Confession  as  the  constant  presupposition.  With 
very  crude  grouping  and  analysis  of  the  kinds  of  activity  treated, 
the  discussion  in  a  way  covers  the  whole  range  of  conduct  in 
the  state,  as  it  presented  itself  to  Seckendorff's  understanding. 

The  first  main  proposition  is  to  the  effect  that  all  the  difficul- 
ties encountered  in  civic  life  come  from  spurious  Christianity. 
Beginning  with  enumeration  of  t)rpes  of  petty  neighborhood 
quarrels,  and  pointing  out  their  departure  from  Christian  pre- 
cepts and  ideals,  the  author  treats  in  a  similar  way  the  grosser 
vices  and  crimes.  Incidentally,  and  by  departing  rather 
obviously  from  his  text,  he  introduces  in  the  fifth  chapter  an 
excursus  of  more  interest  for  our  purpose  than  his  proper  argu- 
ment. It  is  an  observation  bearing  on  the  doctrine  of  popula- 
tion, and  seems  to  have  only  a  forced  relation  to  the  context. 
He  says: 

When  one  however  undertakes  to  speak  of  the  common  means 
of  support  and  the  freedom  of  citizens,  and  of  the  measures  necessairy 
for  improving  their  condition  in  these  respects,  a  considerable  differ- 
ence must  be  taken  into  account  between  countries:  for  the  situation 
is  of  one  sort  in  the  case  of  those  which  derive  their  ordinary  support 
from  agriculture,  and  of  another  sort  with  those  that  are  devoted  to 


98  THE  CAMERALISTS 

trade  and  commerce,  particularly  to  navigation.  Because  less  of 
the  latter  exists  in  Germany,  than  in  other  regions,  we  have  the  more 
occasion  to  speak  of  the  other  sort.  We  must  know,  therefore,  that 
under  ordinary  circumstances  each  region  can  properly  maintain  only 
so  many  people  from  its  own  resources  as  can  get  their  means  of  support 
jrom  its  yield.  For  example,  if  we  consider  a  village  which  has  only 
arable  land  enough  for  the  cultivation  of  ten  plows,  no  more  than 
that  number  of  peasants  or  teamsters  can  profitably  live  there,  but 
the  others  must  get  their  living  by  artisanship,  or  get  a  chance  to 
work  outside  the  boundaries  of  the  locality.  If  this  does  not  occur, 
each  hinders  the  others,  or  there  is  a  scarcity  of  support.  There 
can  also  be  no  more  handworkers  in  the  locality  than  these  peasants 
need,  etc.  (p.  243). 

In  this  paragraph  the  author  seems  to  be  distinctly  on  the 
trail  of  the  law  of  diminishing  returns.  He  certainly  does  not 
squint  toward  the  conception  of  population  which  has  been 
attributed  to  the  cameralists  of  the  following  century.  We  shall 
see  that  his  successors  were  also  much  more  intelligent  on  this 
subject  than  tradition  has  testified. 

After  expanding  the  propositions  quoted,  Seckendorff  ap- 
proaches the  moral  which  he  wishes  to  enforce,  in  this  way: 

Where  the  Christian  doctrine  has  been  accepted,  and  ecclesiastics 
and  esj)ecially  monks  have  been  introduced,  from  the  better  culti- 
vated and  improved  countries,  Italy,  France,  England,  etc.,  also 
the  police,  or  the  more  comfortable  and  at  the  same  time  more  expen- 
sive mode  of  life,  a  change  has  taken  place  in  all  localities  which  could 
not  be  properly  supervised  or  controlled,  especially  because  of  the 
many  magistracies,  but  it  was  allowed  in  many  respects  to  take  its 
own  course.  Accordingly  no  one  understands  why  a  given  occupa- 
tion flourishes  in  a  given  locality,  whether  from  some  particular 
natural  advantage,  or  from  special  skill  on  the  part  of  the  inhabitants. 
The  present  purpose  is  to  urge  that  the  people  chose  their  course  of 
life  almost  entirely  without  reflection,  and  as  a  consequence  they 

do  not  succeed  in  spite  of  diligence Christianity  comes  in 

to  improve  this  state  of  things,  by  laying  down  certain  rules  about 
livelihoofl,  and  especially  atx)ut  moderation. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SECKEXDORl  T  99 

The  point  of  interest  about  this  argument,  for  our  puqKjsc, 
is  not  the  strength  or  weakness  of  the  reasoning,  but  ihc  evi- 
dence it  contains  as  to  the  views  of  the  official  class  at  this 
period  about  the  appropriate  aims  of  government.  However 
practical  men  or  theorists  arranged  their  aims  in  the  relaiion 
of  means  and  end,  the  physical  and  moral  well-being  of  the 
population  governed  was  a  definite  and  positive  purpose.  In 
the  minds  of  the  same  men,  religion  was  also  both  an  end  and 
a  means  with  reference  to  individual  as  well  as  governmental 
welfare.  It  is  not  our  affair  to  criticize  the  crudeness  and  the 
confusion  in  their  reasonings  about  religion,  and  about  its 
relation  to  morals  and  government.  The  main  thing  is  that 
they  actually  recognized  desiderata,  with  some  common  sanc- 
tions of  religion,  of  philosophy,  of  prudential  and  political 
expediency,  which  positively  prescribed  moral  ideals  both  for 
governments  and  for  individuals.  These  standards  of  moral 
value  and  obligation,  which  stood  for  partially  develo[)ed 
interests  in  German  populations,  were  factors,  weaker  or 
stronger,  in  shaping  both  official  and  popular  programmes 
throughout  the  cameralistic  period.  While  other  interests 
were  in  a  sense  paramount,  these  elementary,  and  in  a  sense 
ultimate,  human  interests  were  always  perceptibly  or  imper- 
ceptibly in  the  balance  along  with  other  considerations  of  state, 
and  their  actual  importance,  as  compared  with  the  interests 
of  rulers  as  a  distinct  class,  never  long  at  a  time  ceased  to  gain 
an  increasing  ratio  of  influence. 

It  is  characteristic  of  the  lack  of  system  in  social  ideas  at 
Seckendorflf's  time  that  from  the  remarks  just  quoted  he  passes 
immediately  to  discussion  of  the  sin  of  ta.x-dodging,  as  we  now 
phrase  it,  and  of  evading  military  service  in  the  just  wars  which 
Christianity  does  not  disapprove.  This  leads  to  discussion  of 
the  Christian  ethics  of  conduct  in  war,  and  evils  both  govern- 
mental and  individual  are  enumerated  and  condemned  in 
considerable  detail. 


lOO  THE  CAMERALISTS 

In  the  sixth  chapter  of  this  book,  the  author,  with  a  slight 
departure  from  the  classification  which  he  made  at  the  outset, 
enters  upon  discussion  of  the  ethics  of  the  governing  stratum. 
He  at  once  acknowledges  the  delicacy  of  the  subject.    He  says: 

This  is  a  dangerous  and  difficult  matter:  partly  because  inborn 
human  perversity  provides  that  no  one  hears  the  truth  more  impa- 
tiently than  those  who  have  the  power  to  ignore  it,  and  to  insult 
those  who  present  it;  partly  because,  on  the  other  hand,  it  is  a  duty 
to  avoid  speaking  of  the  failings  of  rulers  in  such  a  way  as  to  stir 
up  hatred  and  scom  and  even  rebellion  among  citizens  toward  those 
rulers  who  try  to  act  as  true  Christians  (p.  255). 

The  wise  suggestion  is  made  in  this  connection  that  preach- 
ers would  often  do  better  to  send  to  rulers  in  writing  their 
complaints  about  bad  government,  than  to  utter  them  in  the 
pulpit,  in  the  presence  of  those  who  least  need  to  hear  them, 
and  in  the  absence  of  those  who  should  be  concerned  with  them 
most.  At  the  same  time  Seckendorff  betrays  very  plain  symp- 
toms of  the  prevailing  tendency  to  demand  that  true  Christian 
subjects  shall  renounce  all  claim  to  a  right  of  bringing  direct 
pressure  to  bear  on  rulers  if  their  government  is  oppressive. 
The  only  recourse  which  his  philosophy  and  theology  fully 
sanction  is  prayer  to  God,  that  He  might  soften  the  heart  and 
instruct  the  mind  of  the  delinquent  sovereign.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  appeal  which  Seckendorff  makes  to  rulers  to  observe 
the  obligations  of  religion  in  their  conduct  of  government,  puts 
the  final  emphasis  not  on  considerations  of  justice,  and  the 
rights  of  the  subject,  but  on  the  rulers'  hopes  of  eternal  happi- 
ness (p.  259). 

However  we  may  appraise  the  force  or  validity  of  the  sanc- 
tions upon  which  Seckendorff 's  political  ethic  relied,  he  cer- 
tainly outlined  a  relatively  exacting  standard  of  governmental 
conduct.  It  began  with  the  obligation  of  setting  a  Christian 
example  to  subjects,  in  personal  habits,  on  the  principle  of 
noblesse  oblige,  and  covered  the  whole  range  of  governmental 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SECKENDORFF  loi 

activities.  Seckendorff  plainly  asserts  (p.  266)  that  Christian- 
ity puts  the  origin  of  ruling  authority  beyond  question.  Thus: 
The  ruling  class  is  ordained  of  God,  although  in  certain  places 
human  means,  such  as  election  or  investiture,  are  instrumental  in 
attaining  that  position,  and  the  specific  duties  of  government  arc  to 
be  learned  from  the  light  of  reason,  and  cannot  be  found  in  revela- 
tion or  the  Holy  Scriptures.  When  a  sovereign  therefore  according 
to  custom  writes  "by  the  grace  of  God,"  that  is  no  vain  title.  It 
shows  rather  in  part  the  sovereignty  [Hoheit],  and  in  part  the  duty: 
the  sovereignty  because  of  sitting  in  the  place  of  God,  and  having 
to  conduct  the  office  according  to  the  divine  order.  Hence  rulers, 
as  such,  are  accountable  first  of  all  to  God,  and  may  also  hope  for 
his  protection.  This  their  sovereignty  they  may  use  for  the  suppres- 
sion of  seditious  thoughts  of  subjects,  when  the  latter  presume  to 
override  the  rulers.  The  duty  may  be  learned  from  the  considera- 
tion that,  because  they  are  ordained  by  the  grace  of  God,  rulers  are 
bound  to  conform  to  the  divine  law,  and  thus  to  promote  the  welfare 
of  the  people  committed  to  them,  and  also  to  observe  and  fulfill 
what  is  promised  according  to  the  ancient  usage  of  the  land  and 

people And  although  in  the  fewest  places  external  means 

of  compulsion  are  to  be  practiced,  and  thus  a  ruler,  if  he  disregards 
his  capitulary  or  his  promise,  sins  before  God  alone,  and  is  liable 
to  no  investigation  by  his  subjects,  yet  the  fear  of  God  will  sufficiently, 
and  more  than  any  external  compulsion,  restrain  him,  and  he  will 
regard  those  who  advise  him  in  a  contrary  way,  and  would  release 
him  from  all  laws,  as  wicked  counselors,  yes,  as  tools  of  the  devil. 
What  is  true  of  these  high  magistrates,  who  are  subordinated  to  no 
other  human  power,  is  true  also  in  its  degree  of  subordinate  rulers,  etc. 

In  the  following  chapter  (vii)  the  author  expands  the  above 
theorems  about  the  authority  of  rulers  by  going  elaborately 
into  the  biblical  and  especially  the  Pauline  doctrine  of  the 
relation  of  rulers  to  other  Christians.  In  chap,  viii,  however, 
he  returns  to  the  other  side  of  the  case,  and  argues  mth  equal 
energy  that — 

At  last  rulers  attain  salvation  in  one  and  the  same  way  as  other 
Christians,  i.  e.,  by  Christian  faith,  the  fruits  of  which  are  love  and 


102  THE  CAMERALISTS 

a  pious  life.  There  is  only  one,  and  that  the  straight  and  narrow 
way,  through  which  is  the  entrance  into  life Just  as  the  poor- 
est peasant,  so  also  the  greatest  king,  must  attain  salvation.  Every- 
thing which  people  of  high  degree  claim  for  themselves  as  emancipa- 
tion, exemption,  and  privilege,  is  sheer  deception,  and  those  who 
help  them  to  these  imaginings  are  their  guides  and  companions 
toward  destruction. 

Upon  this  doctrinal  basis,  exhibit  of  specific  duties  is  con- 
tinued; thus,  further  duties  of  setting  worthy  examples  to 
subjects,  for.  instance,  in  checking  drunkenness  and  neglect 
of  attendance  at  divine  worship  by  members  of  the  court; 
duties  of  the  positive  sort,  such  as  promoting  the  progress  of 
true  religion  among  the  subjects;  in  particular  the  duty  not 
merely  of  protecting  the  institutions  of  religion  but  of  laying 
down  rules  of  church  government.  Christian  rulers  should 
reform  evils  in  the  church  and  the  clergy. 

This  duty  belongs  especially  to  those  Protestant  princes  who 
took  upon  themselves  the  prerogatives  of  Episcopus  in  externis, 
and  who  administer  the  other  jura  Episcopalia,  which  the  bishops 
alone  previously  administered,  either  in  person  or  through  their 
OffidaUsy  through  certain  appointed  and  sworn  persons  called 
Consistoriales  or  Superintendentes  (merely  other  names  for  bishops). 

On  the  other  hand,  it  is  urged  as  the  duty  of  rulers  to  refrain 
from  prescribing  articles  of  faith  for  their  subjects,  even  when 
the  bishops  agree  thereto;  the  duty  of  abolishing  unnecessary 
display  in  church  worship  is  expounded;  the  importance  of 
sound  learning  and  the  reading  of  good  books  by  rulers  is 
emphasized.  At  the  close  of  the  chapter,  subjects  are  exhorted 
to  observe  the  duties  of  true  Christians  in  all  these  matters, 
even  if  rulers  fail  in  any  of  these  respects. 

Chap.  X  develops  the  author's  ideas  of  Christian  duty  with 
respect  to  all  sorts  of  situations  before,  during,  and  in  conse- 
quence of  war.  It  begins  with  the  premise  that  peace  is  a 
good  much  to  be  desired,  and  its  preservation  is  the  first  work 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SECKENDORFF  103 

of  government.  Nevertheless,  righteous  war  being  permissible 
and  necessary,  it  is  the  duty  of  governments  properly  to  prepare 
for  it  and  to  carry  it  on  as  far  as  possible  in  accordance  with 
the  behests  of  religion.  The  implications  of  this  doctrine  arc 
developed  with  considerable  detail.  The  evils  of  war  are 
frankly  admitted,  and  remedies  pointed  out  in  better  observance 
of  Christian  precepts.  It  is  urged  that  "true  and  right  bravery 
in  war  must  spring  from  Christian  courage,  by  reason  of  the 
assurance  of  a  good  conscience,  and  of  a  better  life  after  death" 
(p.  346).  Eleven  clauses  from  the  imperial  articles  of  war  are 
quoted,  to  show  that  Christian  principles  are  recognized  as 
part  of  the  law  of  the  land  for  soldiers.*  The  chapter  contains 
also  an  argument  for  the  reinstitution  of  universal  military 
duty;  an  essay,  in  twenty-seven  sections,  on  organization  and 
discipline  of  a  military  establishment  so  created;  and  concludes 
that  the  proposed  scheme  would  lead  to  successful  ending  of 
war  with  the  Turks,  and  efficient  conduct  of  all  necessary 
minor  wars. 

Chap,  xi  applies  the  test  of  Christian  doctrine  to  the  duties 
of  magistrates  in  administering  justice;  chap,  xii,  to  miscel- 
laneous relations  of  government  to  subjects,  as  in  excessive 
taxation,  in  infringement  upon  proper  liberty,  in  luxurious 
living  at  the  expense  of  subjects,  in  experimenting  with  alchemy 
and  other  magic  arts,  in  manipulating  the  coinage,  in  traffic 
in  public  offices,  and  in  establishing  monopolies. 

The  last  chapter  of  this  second  book  returns  to  one  of  the 
initial  presumptions  of  German  civic  theory,  namely,  that 
the  government  is  bound  to  -perform  the  functions  of  a  presid- 
ing genius  over  the  general  welfare  of  subjects.  At  the  same 
time  it  reiterates  a  theorem  which  in  some  form  and  force  or 
other  plays  its  part  in  all  the  cameralistic  systems.  The  chapter 
begins  with  a  brief  expression  of  both  these  ideas  to  this  effect : 

'I.e.,  from  "des  Heil  R6mischen  Reichs  Reuter-Bcstallung,  Anno 
1570"  (P-  331). 


I04  THE  CAMERALISTS 

From  Christianity,  or  from  Christian  love,  flows  the  provision 
of  God-fearing  rulers  that  their  subjects  shall  have  all  possible  encour- 
agement and  success  in  their  livelihood  and  occupations,  that  their 
numbers  shall  increase  rather  than  diminish,  because  the  greatest 
treasure  of  the  country  consists  in  the  number  of  well-nourished 
people;  and  to  that  end  not  merely  external  peace  and  the  moderation 
of  the  governing  power  in  collecting  taxes,  etc.,  are  useful,  .... 
but  every  other  good  institution  which  governments  may  adopt 
whereby  means  of  livelihood  may  be  assured  to  the  people,  and 
multiplied  in  reliable  ways,  for  the  more  important  Christian  pur- 
pose that  they  may  have  something  to  give  to  the  needy  and  thus 
may  \)C  and  remain  able  to  provide  for  the  support  of  the  community 
[Gemeinen  Wesens]  and  the  care  of  the  poor  and  the  needy. 

In  the  spirit  of  this  introduction,  the  chapter  concludes 
this  division  of  the  author's  system  of  ethics  with  brief  reference 
to  the  duties  of  rulers  toward  vagrants  and  other  forbidden 
types,  such  as  gypsies,  beggars,  etc.;  toward  promotion  of 
profitable  occupations  through  good  police  organization; 
toward  moderation  of  duties  and  imports;  toward  encourage- 
ment of  manufactures  and  commerce;  toward  selection  of 
competent  officials  for  dealing  with  these  subjects:  and  two 
closing  sections  contain  further  warnings  to  subjects  about  their 
own  delinquencies  in  commerce  and  artisanship,  with  praises 
of  i)easants,  artisans,  and  soldiers  for  their  relatively  faithful 
observance  of  Christian  duty,  and  a  final  appeal  to  the  self- 
interest  of  rulers  to  guard  the  welfare  of  these  lower  classes. 

The  third  book  hews  much  less  closely  to  the  lines  of  the 
original  plan  than  the  other  two.  Its  title  is  On  the  Spiritual 
Stratum  and  Its  Reform  in  Particular.  The  author's  treatment 
of  the  ethics  of  his  two  other  divisions  of  activity  leads  to  the 
expectation  that  he  will  follow  the  same  model  with  reference 
to  the  clergy.  Instead  of  this,  the  book  deals  with  every  sort 
of  question  which  could  concern  people  with  ecclesiastical 
interests  at  the  period  of  its  publication.  It  has  sections  which 
would  have  to  be  classed  in  turn  as  exegesis,  church  history, 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SECKENDORFF  105 

dogmatic  theology,  homiletics,  pastoral  duties,  clerical  ethics, 
religious  pedagogy,  the  theory  of  missions,  and  church  polity. 
It  deals  briefly  with  the  education  of  women.  In  so  far  as  it 
touches  clerical  ethics,  it  is  on  the  same  general  basis  as  the 
earlier  books.  The  most  notable  fact  is  the  degree  to  which 
the  relation  of  the  church  to  the  secular  government  is  slurred 
over.  If  one  knew  nothing  of  Seckendorff's  writings  beyond 
this  book,  the  most  obvious  inference  would  be  that  he  had  in 
mind  an  ecclesiastical  organization  practically  identical  with 
that  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal  church  in  the  United  States,  and 
as  independent  of  the  civil  government.  There  are  passages, 
e.  g.,  pp.  705  fE.,  from  which  one  familiar  with  his  previous 
writings  would  immediately  supply  the  necessary  connections 
of  these  details  with  his  whole  theory  of  government.  I  have 
found  no  other  passage  in  the  whole  succession  of  came- 
ralistic  authors  which  treats  of  ecclesiastical  questions  with  so 
little  reference  to  the  relations  with  the  political  administration.^ 
A  more  general  comparison  than  that  of  one  cameralist 
with  another  may  help  to  interpret  the  authors  in  this  group. 
In  one  particular  not  yet  referred  to  Seckendorff  was  typical 
of  all  the  cameralists.  It  may  be  stated  by  contrast  with  Adam 
Smith.  The  latter  was  plainly  a  philosopher  first,  and  inciden- 
tally an  economist.'  The  cameralists  were  first  and  last  theo- 
retical or  practical  administrators.  They  betray  almost  no 
consciousness  that  their  technique  runs  back  to  problems  of 
a  fundamental  philosophy.  The  exceptions  to  this  rule  are  in 
the  form  of  barkings  back  to  religious  premises.  According 
to  their  ecclesiastical  connections,  they  pay  more  or  less  per- 
functory tribute  to  popular  Catholic  or  Protestant  religious 

»  Seckendorff's  Vier  und  vierzig  Teutsche  Reden,  and  PolUische  und 
moralische  Discurse  Uber  dreyhundert  auserlesene  lehrreiche  Spriiche  des 
Lttcani,  I  have  not  been  able  to  obtain. 

*  Vide  Small,  Adam  Smith  and  Modern  Sociology,  pp.  9,  37,  32,  65, 
«t  passim. 


io6  THE  CAMERALISTS 

doctrine.  The  allusions  hardly  go  deeper,  however,  than  to 
phases  of  doctrine  which  might  have  been  derived  merely  from 
their  pre-confimiation  instruction.  In  short,  cameralistics 
was  primarily  a  system  of  and  for  the  bureau.  It  had  only 
indirect  and  remote  affiliations  with  the  academy.  We  shall 
find  that  this  fact  was  a  very  serious  obstacle  to  the  progress 
of  cameralism  as  a  university  subject.  Dithmar  and  Stisser 
will  furnish  typical  evidence. 

In  this  sketch,  then,  we  have  presented  first  of  all  the  con- 
ception of  a  ruler  by  divine  right,  and  of  the  government  which 
he  should  maintain,  as  it  was  put  into  literary  form  by  one  of 
the  men  best  entitled  to  speak  for  the  system.  The  sketch 
is  of  chief  value  for  this  initial  element.  The  secondary  fea- 
tures of  the  regime,  although  in  the  germ  in  Seckendorff's 
d(Ktrines,  will  appear  in  more  mature  form  in  the  descriptions 
of  later  cameralists. 


CHAPTER  V 
THE  CAMERALISTICS  OF  BIXHER 

The  cameralistic  series  next  includes  three  men,  Beclier, 
Homick,  and  Schroder,  whose  chief  contribution  to  the  theory 
was  on  its  mercantiiistic  side.  To  the  first  and  third  of  these 
men  a  chapter  will  be  devoted.  Since  it  has  proved  imjiossihlo 
to  make  a  first-hand  study  of  Homick,  his  place  in  the  dcveloj)- 
ment  of  cameralism  will  be  indicated  more  briefly. 

Johann  Joachim  Becher  was  born  at  Speier  in  1635.  He 
died  in  London  in  1682.  He  was  the  supjwsed  oriuiinator  of 
the  chemical  "phlogiston  theory."  In  the  midst  of  the 
material  and  spiritual  ruin  which  followed  the  Thirty  Years' 
War,  struggling  against  great  difficulties,  he  became  a  self- 
taught  man  of  no  mean  attainments  in  several  directions.  He 
is  said  to  have  supported  himself,  as  well  as,  for  a  time,  his 
mother  and  two  brothers,  by  serving  as  an  informer.  At  the 
age  of  nineteen  he  published  a  monograph,  De  lapide  tris- 
megisto;  six  years  later,  a  Metallurgia;  in  1661,  a  Universal- 
sprache,  etc.  Then  he  entered  into  negotiations  with  the 
Palatine  elector  about  establishment  of  various  factories  in 
Mannheim;  later,  with  the  elector  of  Bavaria  about  founda- 
tion of  a  German  colony  in  Guiana,  a  West  Indian  colony,  etc. ; 
further,  about  the  introduction  of  a  Commercien  collegium,  and 
other  administrative  devices.  In  1666  he  was  teacher  of  medi- 
cine and  body  physician  of  the  elector  of  Mainz,  but  in  the  same 
year  went  to  Vienna  as  Commercienrath.  He  was  sent  to 
Holland  on  an  imperial  errand,  and  in  1667  wrote  in  ten  days 
(?)  his  Methodus  didactica;  and  soon  afterward.  Re  gel  n  dcr 
chrisUichen  ButidesgenossenscJiaft,  his  chief  cameralistic  work, 
if  it  may  properly  be  so  designated.  Meantime  he  had  an 
appointment  as  body  physician  and  chemist  in  electoral  Bavaria 

107 


io8  THE  CAMERALISTS 

and  here  appeared  his  Physica  Subterranea  seu  Acta  Labora- 
torii  Monacensis.  In  the  same  year  he  acquired  a  feudal  title 
for  the  Count  of  Hanau  to  3,000  square  miles  of  land  between 
the  Oronoco  and  the  Amazon,  and  published  a  Gfiindlicher 
Bericht  in  description  of  the  region.  The  plan  was  to  form 
a  "High  German  West  Indian  Company."  Nothing  ever 
came  of  it.  In  1670  Becher  was  called  to  Vienna  in  connec- 
tion with  a  silk  company  and  other  enterprises.  Incidentally, 
while  his  personal  afiFairs  were  developing  poorly,  he  dashed 
oflF  a  programme  for  setting  the  world  to  rights,  in  the  mono- 
graphs Psychosophia  and  Einladung  zu  einer  psychologischen 
Societal.  A  location  for  a  demonstrative  experiment  under 
the  latter  head  was  expected  from  the  bounty  of  the  duke  of 
Giistrow  (1674).  In  1675  Becher  wrote  Theses  chemicas 
veritatem  transmiitationibus  metallorum  evincentis,  and  experi- 
mented in  Vienna  on  extracting  gold  from  the  sands  of  the 
Danube.  His  most  practical  occupation  seems  to  have  been 
at  this  period  as  head  of  a  so-called  Manufacturhaus  in  Vienna, 
an  institution  supported  by  the  government.  He  fell  into 
disfavor,  went  to  Holland,  sold  to  the  city  of  Harlem  a  machine 
for  winding  silk,  and  tried  to  get  the  Dutch  government  inter- 
ested in  his  attempts  to  get  gold  from  sand.  The  enmity  of 
Count  Zinzendorf,  which  had  cut  short  his  stay  in  Vienna,  still 
pursued  him,  and  he  went  to  England  in  1680.  The  imperial 
ambassador  tried  to  obstruct  his  plans  here,  but  the  body 
physician  Dickinson  gave  him  money,  and  he  went  to  Scotland 
to  study  mines  for  Prince  Ruprecht  von  der  Pfalz.  It  is  said 
that  he  wrote  his  Ndrrische  Weisheit  und  weisse  Narrheil  in 
the  twenty-eight  days  (?)  while  he  was  on  the  water  making 
this  trip.  He  returned  to  London  in  1682,  and  died  in 
October  of  that  year.' 

While  Becher's  influence  upon  cameralism  was  somewhat 
indirect,  it  was  actual,  and  must  therefore  be  duly  credited. 

'  Vide  <'>ppenheim,  in  All.  d.  Bib.,  in  loc;  vide  Roscher,  pp.  270  ff. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  BECHER  109 

He  cannot  be  called  in  the  full  sense  a  cameralist.  It  is  even 
doubtful  if  he  ever  regarded  himself  in  that  light  at  all.'  This 
matter  of  labels,  however,  is  not  important.  Whatever  may 
have  been  the  differences  between  Becher  and  the  more  typical 
cameralists,  he  added  something  to  the  content  of  a  theory 
which  at  last  had  a  recognized  place  for  his  type  of  interest. 

While  Becher's  title  to  classification  as  a  cameralist  is 
questionable,  his  moral  rating  is  still  more  dubious.  Some  c»f 
his  vicissitudes  were  more  his  misfortune  than  his  fault,  to  be 
sure,  as  for  example  when  he  was  ostracized  at  Wiirzburg  for 
dissecting  the  body  of  a  woman  who  had  been  executed.  He 
was  nowhere  in  the  favor  of  the  clergy.  The  merchants 
disliked  him  for  his  activities  in  promoting  the  theory  of  the 
organization  of  trading  companies.  He  lost  his  standing  in  the 
Palatinate  by  the  failure  of  a  perpetual-motion  scheme,  and 
he  made  himself  ridiculous  among  scholars  by  a  book  which 
promised  to  teach  all  Haushaltungskunst  in  twenty-four  hours.' 
Taken  in  connection  with  odious  personal  traits,  Becher's 
individual  and  professional  equation  has  simply  the  permanent 
value  for  our  purposes  of  a  factor  in  establishing  a  technical 
tradition. 

Becher's  most  memorable  cameralistic  work  was  jjublished 
in  1668.3  Its  place  in  the  cameralistic  series  is  entirely  different 
from  that  of  Seckendorff.  Indeed,  as  we  have  seen,  it  can  only 
by  accommodation  of  terms  be  said  to  have  had  a  place  in  the 
series.     Each  petty  German  state  had  its  little  army  of  func- 

'  Vide  Discurs,  p.  38,  11.  23,  24. 

'  "  Kluger  Hausvater,  verstdndige  Hausmutler,  voUkommencr  Land- 
Medicus,  wie  auch  erfahrener  Ross-  und  Vieharzl." 

3  D.  Johann  Joachim  Bechers  von  S}>eyer,  Rom.  Kiiyserl.  Majcstiit 
Commercien-Raths  Politische  Discurs  von  den  eigenilichen  Ursachen  des 
Auff-  und  Abnehmens  der  Stiidt  Lander  und  Republicken.  "In  specie: 
Wie  ein  Land  Volckreich  und  Nahrhaflfl  zu  machen,  und  in  eine  rechte 
Societatem  civilem  zu  bringen.  Auch  wird  von  dem  Bauren-  Handwercks- 
und   Kauffmanns-Standt  derer  Handel  und  Wandel,   Item,   von  dem 


no  THE  CAMERALISTS 

tioning  cameralists,  the  hierarchies  of  the  bureaus.  Few  of 
them  wrote  books,  but  in  some  particulars  such  a  sorry  sub- 
stitute for  a  book  as  this  miscellaneous  collection  of  Bee  her 
better  reflects  what  they  were  doing  and  thinking  than  the 
more  systematic  treatises.  Becher's  Discurs  contains  no  direct 
internal  evidence  that  the  author  had  ever  heard  of  Seckendorff. 
It  seems  to  be  the  record  of  the  impression  made  upon  an  unsys- 
tematic mind  by  contact  with  the  workings  of  bureaucracy 
in  various  capitals.* 

In  the  dedication  to  the  emperor  Leopold,  dated  September 
I,  1672,  Becher  asserts  that  his  reasons  for  the  dedication  were 
three:  first,  that  the  book  was  largely  written  while  the  author 
was  on  the  im[)erial  civil  list,  and  that  the  material  was  largely 
collected  in  the  course  of  that  service;  second,  because  enemies 
had  scattered  the  slander  that  the  author  was  of  no  visible 
use  in  the  imperial  service,  and  the  book  would  be  an  answer 
to  the  charge;  third,  because  enemies  who  were  identical  with 
the  enemies  of  the  German  Roman  Empire  and  of  the  imperial 
house  had  attacked  the  author  for  addressing  the  common 
German  Fatherland  in  plain  vernacular  German,  instead  of 
academic  Latin. 

Monopolio,  Polypolio  und  Propolio,  von  allgemeinen  Land-Magazinen 
Nie(kTlagen,  Kaufl-Hausern,  Montibus  Pietatis,  Zucht-  und  Werck 
Hiiuscrn,  Wcchselbancken  und  dergleichen  ausfiihrlich  gehandelt 
Drille  fidition,  mit  vier  Theilen   vermehret,  worinnen   viel   niitzlichc 

widiligc  und  curiosc  Sachcn  begridcn.     Franckfurt M.DC.LX 

XXVIII."     I  have  used  only  this  third  edition.     The  first  is  dated  1668 

'  As  a  sample  of  judgments  passed  upon  Becher  in  less  rritical  scien 
tific  perio<ls  than  ours,  we  may  cite  estimates  quoted  by  Roscher  from 
Zinckc's  Leipziger  Sammlungen  (1758).  Becher  is  spoken  of  as  "the 
first  reformer  of  German  systems  of  artisanship,  manufacture,  trade, 
Polizei,  and  finance."  Of  the  Discurs,  the  same  author  says:  "almost 
to  the  present  time  the  only  fundamental  lxx)k  which  can  be  used  in  a 
certain  degree  as  introduction  to  Stadlwirthschaft  and  its  Policei  system" 
(Ros<  her,  p.  435). 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  BECHER  1 1 1 

Becher  adds  that  he  may  be  reproached  for  the  presumption 
of  dedicatinj^  to  the  emperor  a  hook  which  contains  discussions 
of  commercial  affairs,  with  which  nobility  has  nothing  to  do. 
The  reply  is  that  his  majesty  is  not  expected  to  concern  himself 
directly  with  such  subjects,  but  the  book  is  designed  to  bring 
more  clearly  before  his  eyes  the  fact  that  the  commercial 
classes  are  contributing  to  the  population  and  wealth  of  the 
country,  and  that  ways  and  means  of  establishing  a  populous 
and  self-sustaining  community  are  the  most  suitable  subject- 
matter  of  a  political  policy. 

In  the  Preface  to  the  second  edition  Becher  refers  to  the 
contents  of  the  book  as  Commercien  Materien.  He  must  be 
interpreted,  therefore,  in  contrast  with  SeckendorfT,  as  making 
the  interests  of  trade  his  point  of  departure.  While  Becher 
was  thus  concerned  only  secondarily  with  the  theory  of  admin- 
istrative organization  in  general,  it  is  no  less  true  of  him  than 
of  the  other  cameralists  that  the  test  to  which  he  would  bring 
all  commercial  questions  was  their  relation  to  the  interests  of 
the  state  as  represented  by  the  government. 

Becher  goes  on  to  say  that,  although  the  first  edition  found 
many  enemies,  and  was  in  several  places  forbidden  by  the 
clergy,  yet  it  was  soon  entirely  sold.  It  appears  that  the  imme- 
diate cause  of  the  enmity  of  the  clergy  was  an  innocent  quotation 
u])on  the  title-page  from  the  jurist  Calvinus.  It  was  assumed 
that  John  Calvin  was  the  author  quoted,  and  that  the  book 
must  contain  Protestant  poison! 

Perhaps  the  most  significant  clause  in  this  preface  is  that 
in  which  the  author  anticipates  charges  of  partisanship.  The 
implication  is  that  the  book  contains,  perhaps  the  author  would 
even  have  said  it  is,  a  commercial  programme.  Such  a  pro- 
gramme is  open  to  misconstruction  or  to  disapproval  from 
many  sides.  It  will  wholly  please  no  party.  To  the  non- 
Catholics  it  will  seem  to  be  too  strongly  imperial  or  Spanish 
in  its  leanings;   to  the  Catholics  it  will  appear  too  favorable 


112  THE  CAMERALISTS 

to  Holland,  etc.  Bccher  protests,  however,  that  he  has  intro- 
ducefl  r|(Kumcnts  into  the  collection  rather  as  samples  of  vari- 
ous sorts  of  instruments,  than  because  he  approves  the  policies 
in  the  course  of  which  the  dfxruments  were  executed.  He 
continues:  "The  sole  end  of  this  new  edition  is  on  my  part 
to  give  the  reader  a  formulary  of  various  transactions  and  politi- 
cal concepts  which  serve  the  welfare  of  the  state  "  {des  gemeinen 
Wesens).^  Further  expressions  in  the  Preface  emphasize  the 
fact  that  the  book  was  written  in  an  atmosphere  thick  with  petty 
political  strifes.  Prejudice  and  suspicion  would  construe  it 
as  a  party  [)amphlet,  whether  it  was  so  intended  or  not.  Under 
such  circumstances,  neither  the  author  nor  his  public  could 
take  an  objective  and  critical  attitude  toward  the  abstract 
questions  involved.  The  book  attempted  to  deal  with  public 
policy,  primarily  commercial,  as  a  matter  of  pure  theory.  It 
was  in  s[)ite  of  itself  to  a  large  degree  a  discussion  of  immediate 
policies.  In  drawing  conclusions  aljout  its  contents,  caution 
must  accordingly  always  be  observed  against  generalizing 
specifjc  conclusions  into  universal  doctrines.  Becher  did  not 
undertake  to  [)resent  a  complete  social  philosophy.  His  pur- 
fK)se  must  be  gathered  from  his  own  professions.  "  It  is  enough 
for  me  to  have  done  what  belongs  to  an  upright  German  man, 
namely,  conscientiously  and  faithfully  to  have  served  the  Ger- 
man Fatherland  and  its  head,  the  Roman  Imperial  Majesty." 
Bccher  begins  the  first  section  of  his  introduction  with  this 
f>rcamble  and  definition: 

Since  I  am  now  to  make  a  Ix^ginning  of  showing  wherein  the 
jirosfx  rily  of  a  lanrl  or  of  a  state  consists,  I  must  necessarily  at  the 
outset  call  to  mind  that  man,  as  the  material  of  the  Republic,  is  an 
animal  sociabile,  and  seeks  society,  as  the  sacred  text  itself  says,  "It 
is  not  good  that  man  should  live  alone."  In  order  that  he  may  have 
a  society,  other  and  more  men  are  necessary,  and  that  these  may  be 

'  Reasons  for  this  rendering  will  be  assigned  in  connection  with 
Justi's  employment  of  the  same  phrase.     Vide  below,  p.  299. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  BECHER  113 

bom  God  has  created  the  female  sex  and  ordained  marriage,  the 
end  of  which  is  to  be  fruitful  and  replenish  the  earth.  I  must  call 
to  mind  further  that,  next  to  reason,  human  society  alone  distinguishes 
the  life  of  man  from  that  of  the  beasts,  which  society  is  solely  and 
alone  the  fundamental  cause,  beginning,  means,  and  end  of  all  laws 
and  ordinances  which  men,  both  pagans  and  Christians,  have  made 

for  the  preservation  of  this  society If  then  I  were  rightly 

to  define  a  state  I  should  call  it  a  populous,  self-supporting  community 
[eine  volckreiche  nahrhajte  Gemein]. 

The  two  chief  elements  in  the  concept  are  then  expanded 
in  turn,  to  the  effect  that,  on  the  one  hand,  unless  a  community 
is  populous  it  cannot  defend  itself,  but  must  be  the  prey  of  every 
enemy;  and  on  the  other  hand,  that  a  populous  community 
is  impossible  unless  sufficient  means  of  support  are  at  command. 
The  idea  is  also  emphasized  that  the  people  in  a  community 
furnish  one  another  mutual  support.  They  live  on  one  another. 
"When  the  members  of  a  community  arrange  their  affairs  so 
that  the  one  lives  from  the  other,  the  one  can  earn  his  piece 
of  bread  from  the  other,  yes  that  the  one  plays  his  support  into 
the  hand  of  the  other,  that  is  the  right  community."^  Becher 
accordingly  concludes  that  the  community  is  the  third  person 
of  a  trinity,  people,  sustenance,  community : 

For  where  the  latter  exists,  there  will  be  no  lack  of  people  and 
sustenance;  where  this  is  disturbed  [verstimmt],  however,  there  will 
be  nothing  but  hatred,  enmity,  persecution,  oppression  of  the  poor, 
exaltation  of  the  rich,  rebellion,  and  finally  impoverishment  and 
total  ruin.  Accordingly,  just  as  when  one  is  to  play  on  a  violin  one 
must  first  examine  and  tune  each  string,  so  when  its  sustenance  is 
to  be  assured  to  a  community,  attention  must  certainly  be  paid  to 
every  sort  of  human  being  that  is  there,  and  nothing  appears  to  me 
more  remarkable  than  that  in  many  places  no  thought  whatever  is 
given  to  these  most  difficult  points.     Each  is  left  to  get  his  living  as 

*  It  would  be  unkind  to  ask  Socratic  questions  of  this  wisdom. 
Why  not  let  such  simplicity  alone  and  not  invent  the  historical  fiction 
that  it  is  to  be  understood  as  p>olitical  economy  I 


114  THE  CAMERALISTS 

he  may;  whether  he  is  ruined  and  ruins  a  hundred  others  with  him, 
or  he  prospers,  with  the  common  gain  or  loss,  prosperity  or  adver- 
sity, no  one  asks  any  questions.  Because  this  is  the  crucial  point, 
however,  I  will  do  my  best  to  consider  and  dissect  [anatomiren]  the 
members  of  the  community^  in  respect  to  the  way  in  which  they 
should  work  with  each  other  in  the  matter  of  support,  I  will  try  then 
to  put  them  together,  and  to  form  them  into  a  political  skeleton 
[scdeton  polilicum]. 

In  the  second  section  the  analysis  continues : 

There  are  necessarily  two  sorts  of  people  in  a  community:  the 
first,  the  majority,  the  second  who  are  the  servants  of  the  former, 
and  here  is  included  the  magistracy  [Obrigkeit],  which  is  a  servant 
of  the  community,  and  holds  the  people  in  good  order  and  social 
regulation,  so  that  one  may  live  by  the  side  of  another,  because  the 
community  is  not  for  the  sake  of  the  magistracy,  but  the  magistracy 
for  the  sake  of  the  community.  .Also  the  clergy  are  the  servants  of 
the  community  in  protecting  the  soul,  the  learned  who  protect  the 
mind  [Gemiith],  the  physicians,  apothecaries,  barbers,  bathers,  who 
guard  the  health,  the  soldiers  who  guard  the  body  and  the  whole 
state  and  land.  All  these  are  servants  of  the  community,  and 
although  they  help  to  increase  and  maintain  the  societatem  civilem, 
they  are  still  not  the  community  itself,  but  as  stated  only  servants 
of  the  same,  who  must  be  paid  and  supported  by  the  community, 
and  hence,  in  order  that  they  may  not  become  burdensome  to  the 
community,  they  should  be  made  proportional  by  the  community, 
that  they  should  be  neither  too  many  nor  too  few.  For  if  there  are 
more  Bur  germeister  than  citizens  in  a  city,  more  preachers  and  con- 
fessors than  hearers  and  penitents,  more  schoolmasters  than  pupils, 
more  doctors  than  patients,  more  soldiers  than  citizens  and  peasants, 

more  nobles  than  subjects,  that  land  is  in  bad  shape The 

other  sort  of  people,  who  essentially  constitute  the  civic  society 
[societatem  civilem  essentialiter  constituirn],  are  those  of  whom  the 
society  most  consists,  because  there  are  most  of  them  in  the  society. 
Such  men  now,  whose  servants  the  former  are,  may  properly  be 
divided  into  three  orders.  The  first  is  the  largest,  namely,  the  peas- 
ant order,  the  second  is  the  handicraft  order,  the  third  is  the  trades- 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  BECHER  115 

man's  order.  The  last  is  the  smallest  order While  the  feas- 
ant order  is  the  most  numerous,  it  is  also  the  most  necessary 

In  the  peasant  order  there  are  various  classes Hence  the 

infallible  rule,  Where  there  is  no  peasant,  the  handicraftsman  has 
no  material  to  work  over,  and  where  nothing  is  worked  over  there  the 
tradesman  can  have  nothing  to  sell;  moreover,  while  the  peasant 
cultivates  the  field,  he  cannot  be  at  home,  and  while  the  handicrafts- 
man works  at  home,  he  cannot  run  about  and  sell  his  wares,  and 
while  the  tradesman  does  this  he  cannot  be  a  peasant  or  a  handi- 
craftsman. Hence  follows  the  undoubted  conclusion,  These  three 
orders  should  not  be  mixed  together,  but  it  should  be  possible  for 
them  to  stand  close  together  and  to  make  a  real  community;  that 
is,  to  support  each  other,  for  where  this  occurs,  ....  the  object 
of  a  proper  Policey  is  attained,  i.  e.,  a  respectable  and  necessary 
human  society. 

Referring  not  to  the  cameralists  in  general,  but  to  Bcchcr  in 
particular,  I  cannot  refrain  from  pointing  out  the  resemblance  of 
the  first  part  of  this  remarkable  passage  to  a  pearl  in  a  swine's 
snout.  If  we  accept  the  gem  as  genuine,  we  must  confess  that 
its  occurrence  at  just  this  point  is  an  unexplained  sport  of 
nature.  It  seems  to  shed  almost  pure  light  of  insight  into 
the  vicarious  character  of  human  society.  It  is  an  ungrateful 
task  to  inquire  in  this  case  if  things  really  are  as  they  seem, 
but  I  find  myself  unable  to  accept  these  appearances  at  full 
value.  The  evidence  hardly  warrants  a  theory  in  explanation 
of  ideas  which  seem  to  be  so  at  variance  with  the  conceptions 
of  the  time.  If  I  were  to  propose  an  explanation  it  would  be 
that  this  was  merely  imitation  of  pulpit  conventionalities,  and 
repetition  of  a  stilted  form  which  was  not  vital  with  new  insight 
and  had  not  even  retained  the  spirit  of  the  New  Testament 
doctrine  of  which  it  was  a  hollow  echo. 

I  will  add  but  a  single  query.  If  Becher  actually  saw  that 
society  is  a  system  of  reciprocal  services,  if  he  saw  that  the 
performance  of  functions  for  one  another  is  that  which  makes 
desirable  citizens,  and  failure  to  perform  such  functions  makes 


1 16  THE  CAMERALISTS 

the  undesirable  citizen,  if  he  used  the  term  "servant"  as  a  digni- 
fying epithet  for  citizens  of  the  former  class,  by  what  reasoning 
or  ass(x:iation  of  ideas  did  he  draw  the  line  between  the  few 
whom  he  classed  as  servants  of  society  and  the  many  whom 
he  left  in  the  ignominious  company  of  the  served  ?  Until  we 
are  instructed  by  what  right  the  tiller  of  the  soil  and  the  artisan 
and  the  tradesman  are  rated  as  essentially  less  serviceable 
to  their  fellows  than  those  who  carry  on  the  relatively  non- 
essential occupations,  we  must  conclude  that  Becher's  apparent 
penetration  must  be  held  under  suspicion  as  tawdry  rhetorical 
embellishment. 

We  come  then  to  the  body  of  the  book,  the  first  part  of  which 
treats  of  "the  form  of  the  government,  that  is,  of  those  who 
rule  and  of  those  who  assist  them  therein."  We  may  repeat 
that  it  is  not  our  purpose  to  investigate  the  evolution  of  cam- 
eralism. We  are  not  attempting  to  make  out  the  stages  in  the 
elaboration  of  the  system.  We  are  not  drawing  specific  com- 
parisons between  the  programmes  of  administration  outlined 
by  the  successive  writers,  nor  are  we  trying  to  appraise  the 
relative  merits  of  their  proposals  as  a  governmental  technique. 
Wc  are  studying  them  in  turn  in  order  to  be  justified  in  present- 
ing what  they  have  in  common  as  a  typical  attitude  toward 
social  problems.  We  shall  present  that  attitude  as  it  seems 
to  be  most  characteristically  defined  in  Justi.  Our  use  of  the 
other  writers  is  rather  for  the  purpose  of  assembling  features 
which  belong  in  a  composite  picture,  than  to  distinguish  degrees 
of  theoretical  completeness  or  variations  of  technical  detail. 
We  refer  therefore  to  his  table  of  contents  for  more  specific 
indications  of  Becher's  analysis,  and  we  confine  our  further 
observations  to  a  few  items  which  may  serve  as  shadings  for 
the  picture.  For  this  purpose  we  find  the  opening  paragraph 
available,  viz.: 

As  concerns  the  first  point,  namely  the  kinds  of  civic  authorities 
[Obrigkeilen],  five  sorts  arc  to  be  distinguished,  first  spiritual  or 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  BECHER  117 

secular.  The  proverb  runs,  "where  parsons  rule,  there  is  no  good 
in  the  end."  Because  their  government  is  not  hereditary,  their 
aim  is  only  to  enrich  their  own,  et  fit  pax  in  nostris  diebiis.  If  a  war 
comes,  they  make  themselves  scarce,  after  the  manner  of  the  hireling 
in  the  gospel.  A  secular  lord  does  not  do  this,  for  the  sheep  belong 
to  him,  and  since  there  is  a  succession,  such  rulers  strive  much  more 
for  the  conservation  and  the  improvement  of  the  land. 

Here  speaks  the  partisan,  and  he  reflects  one  of  the  sharpest 
contrasts  of  his  day.  The  issue  was  in  some  respects  more 
acute  in  Catholic  than  in  Protestant  states.  In  the  former, 
the  Refomiation  had  agitated  and  modified,  but  had  left  the 
social  structure  externally  unchanged.  There  was  accordingly 
quite  as  much  restiveness  under  clerical  influence,  and  some- 
times even  more,  than  in  the  Protestant  states,  where  the  politi- 
cal power  of  the  clergy  was  assumed  to  have  been  broken.  In 
Catholic  and  Protestant  states  alike,  the  struggle  between  state 
and  church  was  not  ended,  but  merely  changed  in  detail. 
Neither  Catholic  nor  Protestant  clergy  were  by  any  means 
cured  of  their  lust  for  power.  Whether  openly  or  covertly  there 
was  almost  everywhere  antagonism  between  the  two  types  of  pre- 
tension. In  nearly  every  German  state  the  antithesis  between 
the  temporal  and  the  spiritual  power  was  as  real  if  not  as 
evident  a  political  factor  as  it  had  been  when  the  immediate 
form  of  the  issue  was  Papacy  or  Anti-Papacy.  So  long  and 
so  far  as  this  conflict  was  undecided,  the  cameralism  of  a  given 
German  state  was  in  part  one  of  the  military  arms  of  that  secu- 
larism which  was  still  in  battle  array  against  ecclesiasticism. 

With  entire  sang-froid  as  to  co-ordination  of  categories, 
Becher  follows  tradition  in  naming  as  the  other  types  of  gov- 
ernment: third,  aristocracy,  fourth,  democracy,  fifth,  a  mixture 
of  these. 

The  basic  theorem  of  Becher's  cameralism  is  in  the 
proposition : 

Monarchical  government  has  the  advantage  over  all  the  others, 


ii8  THE  CAMERALISTS 

and  is  the  most  usual.  Indeed  it  is,  so  to  sixiak,  a  duplicate  of  the 
divine  government,  established  in  the  Holy  Scripture,  accepted  of 
all  nations,  and  very  profitable  for  the  community  (p.  14). 

The  claim  on  which  Bcchcr  chiefly  relics  to  support  the 
theorem  is  this: 

A  lord  who  has  a  succession  is  more  concerned  for  his  land  and 
people,  and  makes  their  interests  more  his  own  [hull  bey  iknen  stich] 
than  a  government  to  which  the  sheep  do  not  belong  {sic).  Con- 
sequently a  monarchical  government  is  when  a  ruler  has  his  own 
land  and  people,  and  governs  over  them  according  to  his  own  will 
without  interference  and  limitation  [Einredcn  und  Massgeben],  but 
has  such  rule  in  heredity.' 

In  discussing  the  merits  and  demerits  of  the  different  types 
of  governments,  Becher  assembles  a  list  of  counts  against 
monarchy  and  aristocracy  which  modern  democrats  have 
judged  to  be  decisive.  A  sample  of  his  quality  may  be  cited 
from  the  paragraph  in  which  he  disposes  of  democracy: 

Namely,  where  the  olTicials  are  under  obligation  to  account  to 
the  subjects  for  their  government,  and  the  subjects,  if  they  please, 
are  present  in  council,  and  contribute  their  best  observations,  also 
see  and  hear  the  business  that  is  transacted.  But  the  lacks  above 
found  in  aristocracies  are  also  found  in  democracies.  In  addition 
to  those  it  must  \)e  mentioned  s[X)cifically  that  in  the  democratic 
government  (sic)  there  is  no  respect  for  the  authorities  [der  Obern], 
by  reason  of  the  muhitude  there  is  no  secrecy,  by  reason  of  the  num- 
l)cr  of  voices  there  is  often  an  unskilful  constdtum,  in  a  word,  in  this 
sort  of  government  occur  too  often  factions,  seditions  and  rebellions. 

Having  considered  the  pure  governmental  forms,  Becher 
discusses  mixed  forms  under  the  two  heads  Monarchal  (sic) 

«  The  iMtrallel  should  be  noted,  for  further  use  in  other  connections, 
between  the  argument  from  succession  in  the  case  of  monarchy  and  the 
similar  argument  torlay  in  the  case  of  property.  The  first  stand  taken 
today  against  pcssiblc  modification  of  our  institutions  of  inheritance  is  on 
essentially  the  same  ground  as  that  chosen  by  the  defenders  of  monarchy 
of  the  "benevolent  despot"  type.  Is  the  ground  more  tenable  in  the 
one  case  than  in  the  other  ? 


CAMERALISTICS  Ol-   BKCHliR  119 

and  Aristocratic  (p[).  16  ff.)  and  reaches  almost  the  idcniifal 
judgment  in  favor  of  mixed  monarchy  which  he  exprchscd 
four  pages  earlier  in  favor  of  pure  monarchy,  viz. : 

Among  all  sorts  of  governments  this  mixed  form  retains  thf 
preference,  and  is  most  in  voj^ue  in  Kurofx.'.  Indeed  the  Roman 
Empire  itself  consists  at  this  moment  of  such  a  government.  The 
Roman  emperor  is  the  supreme  head,  and  [)resents  a  monanli. 
The  eight  Electors  are  the  Semnrrs  Imperii,  el  Palres  eonscripti, 
the  [)rinccs,  estates,  and  cities  present  as  it  were  a  flemocrary.  All 
these  three  parts  secure  themselves  against  one  another.  Thii.s 
the  electoral  princes  require  of  the  emjx^ror  the  capitulation,  while 
on  the  other  hand  they  must  take  the  oath  of  allegiance  to  him. 
Princes,  estates,  and  cities  of  the  Empire  also  co-of)erate  in  hoth  ways, 

and  enter  into  both  the  above   forms  of  obligation This 

mixed  form  of  government  then  is  the  sole  conservation  of  the  Roman 
Empire,  the  guarantee  that  it  will  never  be  an  absolutitm  purum  vrl 
aristocraticum,  or  a  Democraticum  Imperium,  for  if  this  .should  hap- 

f)en  the  remaining  freedom  would  be  at  an  end The  mixed 

form  is  thus  the  best,  but  it  should  be  in  superlativo  monarchical, 
in  comparativo  aristocratic,  and  in  positivo  flemocratic.  Hence  it 
is  evident  that  the  Roman  emperor  in  this  mixed  government  should 
have  the  most  to  say,  and  that  it  would  not  be  well  if  the  imperial 
sovereignty  were  too  strictly  held  down  by  capitulations 

One  who  had  read  Seckendorf!  would  instantly  decide  that  in 
this  chapter  he  was  dealing  with  an  inferior  order  of  mind. 
There  is  no  such  discrimination  here  as  that  which  \vc  found 
in  Der  FUrsten  Stoat  between  the  king  and  the  tyrant,  although 
we  must  confess  that  the  earlier  writer  was  as  much  in  the  dark 
as  the  later  about  means  of  eliminating  the  one  type  and  secur- 
ing the  other.  I  cannot  believe  that  res[)onsible  statesmen, 
or  even  strong  thinkers  of  the  academic  tyj)c,  could  have 
regarded  this  chapter  seriously.  It  bears  no  marks  of  deriva- 
tion from  evidence  which  would  have  been  likely  to  carry 
weight  with  experienced  men,  even  in  that  less  exacting  j)eri()d. 
It  is  a  jumble  of  judgments  about  confused  and  unauthentic 


I20  THE  CAMERALISTS 

statements  of  fact.  It  shows  no  evidence  of  insight  into  the 
contemporary  meaning  of  the  Roman  Empire.  It  speaks  of 
government  as  though  iTt>  more  personal  interests  were  con- 
cerned than  those  of  rulers  on  the  one  hand,  and  princes,  estates, 
and  cities  on  the  other.  It  is  in  short  a  schoolboyish  essay  on  a 
subject  of  which  the  elements  were  not  comprehended  by  the 
writer.  It  had  approximately  the  same  relation  to  the  more 
respectable  contents  of  the  book  which  we  shall  discover  below 
between  the  historical  survey  at  the  beginning  of  Justi's  Staats- 
wissenschaft  and  the  portions  of  which  he  was  competent  to 
speak  from  pertinent  evidence.  It  was  the  perfunctory  work 
of  a  man  retained  by  a  type  of  government  which  he  was  bound 
to  support. 

The  second  chapter  (pp.  2of!.)  treats  of  the  "qualities  and 
correlations  of  those  who  rule  and  those  who  serve  the  ruler." 
The  style  suggests  the  hearsay- quality  of  the  so-called  "society 
novel,"  written  by  an  author  whose  ideas  of  society  are  gained 
through  other  novels  or  the  newspapers  and  observation  of 
supposed  representatives  of  society  in  public  places.  One 
can  hardly  imagine  that  the  ruling  class  could  have  had  any 
use  for  the  book,  except  to  promote  its  circulation  among 
those  in  whom  rulers  and  their  courtiers  would  like  to  inculcate 
the  notion  that  their  superiors  consulted  such  oracles. 

For  example,  the  first  specification  is  tl;»at  a  ruler — 

....  must  before  all  things  consider  whether  he  has  come  legiti- 
mately or  illegitimately  to  his  station,  for  upon  this  foundation  he 
may  infallibly  rest  all  his  future  weal  or  woe,  and  easily  guess  that 
he  who  seizes  at  government  by  violence  will  also  usually  be  expelled 
by  force  and  he  whose  cause  is  just  will  have  God's  help,  though 
all  the  world  should  be  opposed. 

A  most  edifjring  doctrine,  but  hardly  likely  to  strike  the 
ruling  classes  as  a  novel  variation  of  the  stock  formulas  of  the 
preachers,  or  to  exert  great  influence  against  the  esoteric  prac- 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  BECHER  121 

tices  of  their  kind.  The  second  specification  is  a  similar 
platitude,  viz.: 

The  magistracy  must  preserve  order  in  its  affairs,  and  must 
observe  a  strict  routine:  i.  e.,  not  write  letters  when  it  is  the  time  to 
go  to  church,  not  hunt  when  a  session  of  the  council  should  be  held, 
etc.,  etc. 

The  third  detail  is  one  which  a  Louis  XVI,  for  instance, 
found  it  difficult  to  arrange,  viz. : 

A  ruler  must  be  sagacious,  and  himself  understand  the  art  of 
governing,  in  order  that  he  need  not  always  believe  the  doctors. 
There  are  sometimes  rulers  who  are  not  sagacious,  others  are  too 
sagacious.  The  first  do  not  know  how  to  discriminate  between 
counsels,  and  must  therefore  follow  all  their  advisers.  The  others 
will  never  follow  advice,  and  resort  to  compulsion  whenever  they 
are  opposed. 

It  does  not  seem  to  have  occurred  to  Becher  that,  under 
the  regime  in  which  he  was  employed,  it  would  be  just  as  logi- 
cal for  a  writer  on  farming  to  specify  the  sorts  of  weather  to 
be  desired.  The  specifications  would  have  had  as  much  com- 
petence practically  in  the  one  case  as  in  the  other. 

Fourth,  some  rulers  are  too  diligent,  others  too  indolent 

Fifth,  there  are  rulers  who  in  their  action  and  character  are  either 

too  deliberate  or  too  hasty Sixth,  sometimes  rulers  have  too 

short  memories,  and  sometimes  they  remember  grudges  too  long. 
....  Seventh,  a  ruler  should  be  neither  too  credulous  nor  too  incred- 
ulous  Eighth,  in  all  these  things  it  will  be  very  helpful  if  a 

ruler  has  a  care  for  his  authority,  does  not  make  himself  too  common, 
but  is  heroic,  brave  and  resolute:   but  he  must  not  be  too  distant, 

arrogant,  and  proud Ninth,  a  ruler,  government,  and  land 

should  seek  the  same  consideration  among  neighboring  states  as  at 

home,  but  to  that  end  should  not  be  quarrelsome,  etc Tenth, 

a  ruler  must  find  the  mean  between  prodigality  and  parsimony 

Eleventh,  a   ruler  should  be   neither  too  communicative  nor  too 

reserved Twelfth,  the  cardinal  virtue  of  great   lords  and 

rulers  is,  finally,  that  they  should  be  just  and  merciful.  Too  severe 
is  tyranny,  too  sympathetic  is  womanish. 


122  THE  CAMERALISTS 

There  follows,  in  similar  style,  a  scries  of  ten  propositions, 
which  Bccher  calls  "the  ten  commandments"  for  the  use  of 
rulers  in  relations  with  their  servants.  The  illustrations  by 
which  the  several  specifications  in  the  two  series  are  enforced 
contain  rich  material  for  the  culture  history  of  the  period. 
They  show  that  the  abuses  which  at  length  doomed 
quasi -absolutism  were  evident  enough,  even  then,  to  those 
who  cared  to  observe  them.  But  they  show  more  ])lainly 
that  they  had  hardly  begun  to  make  for  mwlification  of 
the  fundamental  political  presumptions  held  by  cameralistic 
theorists.  The  inference  from  them  is  merely,  "the  wise 
ruler  should  do  so  and  so."  The  fact  that  the  presumptions 
of  quasi-absolutism  provide  the  j)eople  with  no  way  of  requiring 
the  ruler  to  observe  these  prece[)ts  had  not  yet  weakened  these 
presum[)tions  in  the  minds  of  the  cameralists.  We  shall  find 
that  this  continues  to  be  the  case,  with  no  acknowledged  modi- 
fication, and  so  far  as  decisive  evidence  goes  with  no  great 
modification  even  in  the  jmvate  opinion  of  this  type  of  theorist, 
imtil  the  movement  for  constitutionalism  had  won  its  right  to 
recognition. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  total  impression  of  the  collection  of 
commonplaces  in  the  chapter  before  us  is  that  of  a  rather  strong 
ap[)eal  to  the  self-interest  of  princes  to  observe  the  rules  of 
prudence  and  justice  in  the  treatment  of  their  people.  There 
is  surprising  directness  in  the  hint  contained  in  such  words  as 
these: 

A  great  lord  must  know  that  he  must  deal  cautiously  with  soldiers 
and  learned  folk,  for  sword  and  quill  are  two  sharp  and  glorious 
instruments.  The  sword  has  often  marred  the  master  whom  it 
had  previously  served,  and  the  quill  can  praise  and  blame,  it  can 
write  panegyrics  and  satires,  it  can  also  write  those  things  which 
find  their  way  to  the  ends  of  the  earth,  and  no  one  is  exempt  from 
its  influence.  Hence  it  is  well  for  great  lords  to  be  more  careful 
with  their  servants  and  subjects  than  with  their  closest  kin  (p.  27). 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  BECHER  123 

The  bearing  of  the  material  ])ros[)crity  and  moral  well- 
being  of  the  subjects  upon  the  strength  of  the  state  and  of  the 
prince  is  repeatedly  urged,  and  indeed  is  seldom  entirely  out 
of  sight  in  the  cameralistic  arguments.  The  intimate  history 
of  the  court  of  each  German  principality  would  have  to  l^e 
investigated  in  connection  with  the  cameralistic  doctrines 
current  from  generation  to  generation  in  each,  if  we  were  to 
know  how  actual  government  and  the  theories  of  the  cameral- 
ists  reacted  upon  each  other  as  alternate  cause  and  effect. 

In  chap,  iii,  on  "the  form  and  order  of  a  good  government," 
Becher  attempts  to  set  forth  "the  universal  political  laws  by 
which  land  and  people  are  conveniently  and  well  governed." 
He  regards  it  as  necessary,  however,  to  begin  the  cha])ter  with 
"a  short  digression,  and  as  a  preliminary  to  show  how  and 
whence  magistracies  and  laws  are  derived,  how  they  must  be 
constituted  [bestellt]  and  how  far  they  extend." 

The  origin  of  governments  is  explained  upon  the  traditional 
dogmatic  basis,  and  there  is  nothing  to  indicate  that  the  stilted 
thought  and  expression  contained  anything  more  than  prudent 
reflection  of  prevailing  orthodoxy.     Thus: 

Government  is  said  to  be  the  means  by  which  man  is  enabled 
to  live  according  to  his  nature,  which  is  created  in  the  divine  image. 
This  nature  is  made  up  of  five  elements  [Stiicke],  each  corresponding 
to  one  of  the  cardinal  elements  in  the  nature  of  the  divine  being. 
These  latter  are,  (i)  his  existence,  (2)  his  perfection,  (3)  his  omni- 
science, (4)  his  omnipotence,  (5)  his  eternity.  Accordingly,  after 
"the  fall,"  by  which  man  had  lost  the  ability  to  realize  the  divine 
image  in  himself,  God  instituted  government,  and  gave  laws  to  bind 
men  to  the  laws  of  nature.  Since  the  laws  of  nature  are  of  five 
sorts,  so  there  are  now  in  the  wodd  five  strata  [Slande],  laws  and 
governments,  (i)  The  spiritual  stratum  and  its  laws  affect  religion. 
(2)  The  moral  laws  affect  honor,  virtue,  good  conduct,  and  the  nobil- 
ity (sic!).  (3)  The  doctrinal  stratum  and  its  laws  affect  the  learned 
and  sciences.  (4)  The  civil  courts  pertain  to  possessions,  sustenance, 
and  goods.     (5)  The  criminal  court  has  to  do  with  body  and  life, 


124  THE  CAMERALISTS 

under  which  may  be  included  the  maintenance  of  health,  and  defense 
by  force  and  war.     The  exposition  continues: 

"Since  in  these  five  points  all  is  included  which  belongs  to  the 
maintenance  of  the  human  condition,  in  order  to  govern  these  five 
kinds  of  laws  and  their  subjects,  that  is,  to  hold  men  in  the  state  of 
humanity  and  the  natural  laws,  God  has  ordained  magistracy  [Obrig- 
keil]  which  should  be  obeyed  as  God  himself.  As  has  been  said, 
it  is  the  office  of  the  rulers  by  good  laws  to  maintain,  protect,  govern, 
and  control  their  subjects  in  the  true  religion;  love  and  knowledge 
of  God;  in  good  morals,  discipline,  honor  and  integrity;  in  good 
and  various  sciences;  with  respect  to  their  support  and  honorable 
earnings,  their  health  and  life,  also  legitimate  increase.  In  these 
five  points  consists  the  origin  of  all  laws  and  the  foundation  of  author- 
ity and  obedience.'  ....  Hence  arises  an  important  double  ques- 
tion, namely,  in  what  form  princes,  lords  and  the  nobility  in  their 
government  receive  an  hereditary  succession  and  complete  power 
over  the  subjects  ?  Is  it  that  they  should  make  them  chattels,  and 
sell  them  at  will  to  others,  incidentally  with  no  respect  for  the  above- 
mentioned  welfare  of  the  subjects;  i.  e.,  that  they  should  act  con- 
trary to  all  the  five  points  above  indicated;  and  can  subjects  with 
good  conscience  obey  rulers  of  this  sort  ?" 

Becher's  attempt  to  answer  the  latter  question  throws  still 
stronger  light  upon  the  obsession  of  quasi-absolutism  which 
is  the  determining  factor  in  the  thought  of  the  time.  He  had 
no  difficulty  in  entertaining  the  supposition  that  a  ruler  might 
be  oppressive.  The  possibility  does  not  app)ear  to  have  shaped 
itself  in  his  imagination  that  the  oppressed  might  conceivably 
g<jvem  themselves.  When  the  hjrpothetical  question  is  put 
in  terms  which  make  obedience  to  an  oppressive  ruler  intoler- 
able, the  only  alternative  which  Becher  is  able  to  consider  is 
recourse  to  another  ruler.    Thus  he  says: 

Here  arises  the  most  difficult  question,  Who  shall  pass  on  the 
errors  of  the  government?    For  it  is  not  seemly  for  the  subjects 

'  For  further  expansion  of  this  theme,  Becher  refers  to  his  tract, 
Bilanx  humanae  /elicitatis  et  infelicitatis. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  BECHER  1 25 

themselves  to  censor  their  government.  I  say  therefore  they  should 
lay  their  complaints  before  their  neighbors'  or  other  unpartisan 
judges,  and  urge  their  government  to  answer,  and  much  rather  intmst 
the  matter  to  strangers,  than  attempt  to  carry  it  out  themselves 
^P-  45)- 

Immediately  following  this  passage,  Becher  distinguishes 
between  pagan  and  Christian  slavery.  He  calls  the  former 
tyrannical;  he  pronounces  the  latter  conducive  to  the  good  of 
the  subjects.  He  urges  accordingly  that  peasants  have  no 
right  to  resist  their  lords,  when  the  latter  coerce  them  for  their 
own  (the  peasants')  good !  Thereupon  he  adds  the  judgment 
that  rulers  will  be  condemned  by  the  heavenly  powers  to  tem- 
poral misfortune  and  eternal  punishment  if  they  are  utterly 
regardless  of  their  subjects'  good. 

Having  thus  satisfied  his  conscience  by  warning  rulers  of 
the  supposed  consequences  of  misusing  their  power,  Becher 
turns  to  the  positive  question.  By  what  means  are  the  five 
departments  of  government  above  indicated  to  be  carried  on  ? 
The  reply  is  that  a  ruler  who  purposes  to  govern  with  regard 
to  what  has  been  said,  should  organize  five  distinct  collegia, 
each  to  have  in  charge  one  of  the  five  sorts  of  laws  and  admin- 
istration above  scheduled. 

The  first  collegium  should  have  charge  of  the  souls  of  the  sub- 
jects, their  religion,  worship,  fear  of  God,  etc.  The  second  should 
care  for  the  moral  discipline  of  the  subjects.  The  tl.ird  should  be 
charged  with  the  education  of  youth,  promotion  of  the  sciences,  etc. 
The  fourth  is  civil,  and  attends  to  ordinary  questions  touching  tem- 
poral prosperity  of  the  state,  property,  outlays,  and  income.  The 
fifth  might  be  called  collegium  vilale,  for  its  duties  are  with  the  health 
and  protection  of  the  subjects,  against  both  secret  and  public  enemies. 

The  further  exposition  of  the  duties  of  these  bureaus  con- 
sists more  of  incoherent  complaints  about  evils  which  need 
correction  in  the  different  groups  of  activities  than  of  technical 

«  That  is,  neighboring  governments. 


126  THE  CAMERALISTS 

details.  The  inference  is  that  most  of  this  organization,  so  far 
as  the  author  was  informed,  was  not  yet  in  existence.  There- 
upon follows  in  the  fourth  chapter  a  sample  scheme  of  Policey. 
It  is  a  plan  approved  by  the  bishop  of  Mainz  for  adoption  in 
his  episcopal  city,  but  apparently  not  actually  put  into  execu- 
tion (p.  60).  It  is  a  code  of  city  ordinances,  and  it  is  a  first- 
rate  source  of  information  about  municipal  conditions  in  Mainz 
at  the  middle  of  the  seventeenth  century. 

The  speculative  and  academic  character  of  this  first  part 
of  the  Discurs  leaves  the  impression  that  it  was  in  efifect  rather 
hortatory  than  responsible.  The  inference  which  it  suggests 
throughout  is  that,  so  far  as  Becher  was  acquainted  with  the 
facts,  provision  for  all  these  details  of  administration  was  incom- 
plete and  inefficient. 

Part  II  proposes  an  analysis  of  "the  material  of  the  republic, 
that  is,  of  those  who  are  governed,  namely  the  subjects."  In 
comparison  with  the  first  part,  this  portion  of  the  book  seems 
to  reflect  less  certain  conventional  forms  of  thinking,  if  not  of 
acting,  and  more  of  the  author's  own  individuality.  Although 
this  second  part  is  amateurish  enough,  it  bears  evidence  of 
closer  approach  to  the  affairs  discussed  than  is  visible  in  the 
earlier  chapters.  The  inference  that  the  author  was  not  pri- 
marily a  cameralist  is  strengthened.  That  is,  in  the  course 
of  his  occupational  mutations  he  had  now  become  interested 
in  promoting  trade.  Under  the  circumstances  of  the  time, 
the  only  hope  of  accomplishing  much  in  this  direction  was 
through  governmental  initiative.  Becher  accordingly  patched 
his  a[)|)cal  for  attention  to  the  promotion  of  trade  into  a  sort 
of  general  cameralistic  scheme.  It  does  not  appear,  however, 
that  the  aim  to  strengthen  the  government  was  as  distinctly 
central  ami  i)aramount  in  his  thinking  as  in  the  programmes 
of  the  more  typical  cameralists.  Indeed,  we  may  say  that, 
so  far  as  this  book  is  concerned,  he  was  in  rather  striking  con- 
trast with  them.     His  chief  puri)osc  could  not  be  called  ecu- 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  BECHER  127 

nomic  in  the  scientific  sense,  but  it  was  primarily  commercial 
and  secondarily  political.  If  Roscher  had  not  ranked  him 
with  the  cameralists,  the  perspective  of  the  literary  history 
of  the  period  would  be  more  accurately  indicated  by  passing 
him  over  with  a  much  briefer  notice  than  the  undue  prominence 
given  to  him  by  Roscher  will  permit. 

This  second  part  of  the  Discurs  may  be  described  as  an 
account  of  the  state  of  trade  in  Germany.  The  subject  is 
approached  through  a  characterization  of  the  three  strata  that 
make  up  the  bulk  of  the  population — the  traders,  the  artisans, 
and  the  peasants.  Because  this  was  more  nearly  fallow  ground 
as  a  literary  theme  than  the  subject  of  government  in  the  abstract, 
Becher  could  appropriate  less  in  the  way  of  current  generaliza- 
tion, and  the  result  is  a  painful  exhibition  of  untrained  powers 
of  expression.  The  style  is  hopelessly  involved.  The  sen- 
tences run  distractedly  from  one  predicate  into  another,  and 
their  relation  to  their  subjects  is  left  so  largely  to  the  discretion 
of  the  reader  that  the  precise  affirmation  intended  by  the 
author  is  always  open  to  doubt.  So  far  as  distinct  steps  in 
the  argument  are  discoverable,  the  following  is  the  main  line 
of  thought  (pp.  98  ff .) : 

1.  These  three  strata  should  be  under  one  administration,  not 
three,  else  confusion  will  result. 

2.  The  main  end  to  be  aimed  at  for  these  strata  is  increase  of 
their  numbers. 

3.  Consumption  is  the  center  and  source  of  the  well-being  of 
these  strata.  The  fundamental  aim  of  governmental  policy  there- 
fore should  be  to  promote  consumption.  In  a  word,  consumption 
maintains  these  three  strata.  Consumption  is  their  soul.  Con- 
sumption is  the  only  means  of  binding  these  strata  together,  and  it 
enables  them  to  live  upon  one  another.  For  promoting  consumption, 
indeed,  the  trading  stratum  is  necessary  in  the  community  in  pro- 
portion to  the  size  of  the  peasant  stratum.  The  latter  increases 
the  population,  but  the  former  nourishes  it  (sic),  for  as  I  shall  pres- 
ently show,  the  sole  consumption  of  these  three  strata,  and  thus  their 


128  THE  CAMERALISTS 

sustenance,  depends  on  the  merchant,  for  the  artisan  lives  on  him 
and  the  peasant  on  the  artisan.  I  am  best  acquainted  with  such  of 
this  stratum  as  are  wholesalers  [Fer/d^er].'  ....  These  wholesalers 
■must  truly  be  regarded  as  the  foundation  pillars  of  the  community. 

4.  Trade  in  foreign  goods,  when  the  same  could  be  produced 
at  home,  makes  for  the  destruction  of  the  community.  Instead  of 
favoring  men  who  enrich  themselves  by  bringing  in  foreign  goods, 
we  ought  to  deal  with  them  as  the  meanest  criminals  (p.  106).  On 
the  other  hand,  those  merchants  by  whom  the  state  gains  in  money 
and  sustenance  are,  next  to  nature,  the  nursing-mother  that  makes 
the  desert  to  bloom. 

This  theme  is  elaborated  with  a  zeal  that  the  earlier  sections 
did  not  betray. 

5.  These  three  strata  have  three  dangerous  and  highly  harmful 
and  destructive  enemies:  the  first  checks  population,  viz.,  Monopo- 
lium;  the  second  limits  means  of  support,  Polypolium;  the  third 
divides  the  community,  Propolium. 

In  a  following  section  these  three  abuses  are  considered  in  turn; 
the  first  being  described  as  "when  one  member  alone  in  the  com- 
munity has  that  in  the  way  of  support  upon  which  otherwise  many 
others  could  live."  The  term  Polypolium  (unrestricted  competition 
for  employment)  is  defined  by  the  statement: 

"In  order  to  remedy  the  evils  of  monopoly  the  Dutch  have 
abolished  all  'ZUnffte,*  and  have  admitted  Polypoliu\n,  in  that 
everyone  is  at  liberty  to  earn  his  living  as  he  may,  on  which  account 
people  flock  thither  in  great  numbers  and  rob  one  another  of  work 
....  by  which  the  traders  and  wholesalers  keep  the  artisans  in 
constant  poverty  and  toil." 

Propolium  is  not  directly  defined,  but  Becher  evidently  uses  the 
word  in  the  sense  of  the  old  English  terms  "forestalling"  and 
"engrossing." 

From  this  general  introduction  Becher  passes  to  his  specific 
and  technical  material,  the  state  of  trade,  and  wise  methods  of 

»  Becher  applies  the  term  to  the  type  in  the  industrial  system  of  the 
time  which  combined  the  processes  of  the  modem  manufacturer  and 
jobber.  They  not  only  kept  large  stocks  of  goods,  but  they  furnished 
capital  to  those  who  produced  the  goods  (p.  103). 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  BECHER  129 

promoting  it,  through  a  general  account  of  trading  companies, 
as  devices  by  which  the  evils  of  monopoly  and  of  Polypolium 
may  be  avoided.  Having  specified  the  general  conditions 
under  which  he  would  have  the  privileges  of  such  companies 
restricted,  Becher  divides  trade  into  fourteen  types,  "to  which 
all  others  may  be  reduced."  For  each  of  these  branches  of 
trade  he  proposes  the  organization  of  a  trading  company  under 
governmental  patronage  and  control. 

This  then  completes  the  theoretical  part  of  the  book.  The 
remainder  is  occupied,  first,  with  a  survey  of  the  condition 
of  each  of  these  fourteen  branches  of  trade,  second,  with  a 
miscellaneous  collection  of  documents  illustrating  commercial 
and  other  transactions  more  or  less  properly  governmental, 
with  which  in  most  instances  Becher  claims  to  have  had  some- 
what intimate  connection. 

We  may  append  all  that  it  is  necessary  to  say  about  the  second 
of  the  three  men  named  in  the  opening  paragraph  of  this  chapter. 

Philipp  Wilhelm  von  Ht^mick  (sometimes  written  Horaigk, 
Horaeck,  etc.)  was  bom  in  1638.  He  sijent  his  early  years  in  Vienna, 
studied  law  at  Ingolstadt,  and  obtained  the  Doctor's  title  there  in 
166 1.  He  lived  a  considerable  time  at  Vienna,  visited  the  German 
courts  on  a  political  mission  in  the  company  of  the  Spanish  Fran- 
ciscan and  Bishop  of  Croatia,  Christopher  Rojas,  and  al)out  1690 
entered  the  service  of  Cardinal  Lamberg,  Prince  Bishop  of  Passau, 
as  Privy  Counselor.  He  died  in  1712.  His  first  political  publica- 
tion was  Hippophili  Galeadi  de  Comdiis  Francopolitae  wahrer 
Bericht  von  detn  alien  Konigreich  Australien,  in  which  he  argued 
for  political  consolidation  of  the  estates  of  the  German  Empire,  and 
support  of  a  common  army  to  resist  French  attempts  at  annexation. 
The  book  which  appears  to  have  made  most  impression  appeared 
in  1684,  with  the  title,  Oesterreich  iiber  ailes,  Wann  es  nur  will.  Das 
ist:  Wohlmeinender  Fiirschlag,  Wie  MUtdst  einer  Wohlbestellten 
Landes-Oeconomie,  Die  Kayserl.  Erh-Lande  in  kurtzem  iiber  alle 
andern  Staaten  von  Europa  zu  erheben,  und  mehr  ah  einiger  derselben, 
I'on  denen  andern  independent  zu  machen. 


130  THE  CAMERALISTS 

From  all  the  allusions  to  the  book  which  I  find  in  the  cameralistic 
series,  as  distinguished  from  later  commentators,  I  discover  no 
reason  for  crediting  the  author  with  firstrate  constructive  influence 
upon  the  theory.  Roscher  quotes  the  publisher  of  the  edition  of 
1784  to  the  effect  that  "Austria  owes  to  this  book  the  greater  portion 
of  its  well-being."  If  this  is  not  gross  exaggeration,  it  is  very  strange 
that  the  theorists  betray  so  little  sense  of  debt  to  him.  Since  I  have 
been  unable  to  examine  the  book,  my  opinion  is  of  little  value,  but 
all  the  indications  which  the  succeeding  cameralistic  books  contain 
lead  me  to  classify  Homick  with  his  brother-in-law  Becher  by  the 
modem  commercial  term  "promoter."  Apparently  Homick  made 
an  impressive  argument  for  industrial  and  commercial  development. 
If  he  did  more  than  this  for  cameralistic  theory,  I  have  been  unable 
to  trace  it.   (Vide  Inama,  All.  d.  Bib.,  in  loc.,  and  Roscher,  pp.  289  ff.) 

The  following  paragraphs  contain  the  substance  of  Roscher's 
account  of  Homick's  book.* 

This  book  was  written  under  immediate  influence  of  impressions 
made  by  the  frightful  experiences,  of  Germany,  and  especially  Aus- 
tria, in  the  eastem  and  western  wars  between  1680  and  1684.  I 
recall  only  on  the  side  of  Louis  XIV  "the  Chambers  of  Reunion," 
1680,  the  conquest  of  Strassburg  and  Casale,  1681,  the  French  inva- 
sion of  the  Spanish  Netherlands,  1683,  the  seizure  of  Luxembourg 
and  Trier,  1684:  all  as  humiliating  as  the  contemporary  siege  of 
Vienna  by  the  Turks  was  horrible.  "The  cunning  of  the  French 
has  brought  almost  everything  into  such  chaos,  that  one  can  reckon 
one's  dates  from  nothing  except  God  and  oneself,"  says  Homick 
(chap.  li).  But  the  author  hopes  for  "decisive  war  with  that  arrogant 
nation"  which  "will  find  its  way  into  France"  (25).  The  thing  to 
do  is  to  make  economic  preparations  for  that  altemative,  especially 
as  France  bases  its  predominance  quite  essentially  upon  economic 
things.  "Would  to  God  we  might  take  the  general  French  pro- 
gramme [aUgemeine  Lands -Oeconomie]  in  many  particulars  as  a 
good  model  (23).  No  state  in  Europe  can  look  to  its  policy,  without 
either  in  much  or  in  little  thereby  breaking  with  hated  France" 
(33).    There  can  be  no  more  dallying  in  Austria.    The  might  of 

>  Op.  cit.,  p.  39a 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  HIX'IIKR  131 

a  jK'oplc  dc'f)cn(ls  essentially  upon  ihc  ratio  of  its  means  to  those 
of  its  ncijj;hbors.  Xow  Germany,  as  compared  with  the  mij^hty 
advances  made  by  France,  England,  and  Holland  in  the  last  hundre*! 
and  fifty  years,  has  not  only  stood  still  (7)  but  through  war,  Refor- 
mation, loss  of  population,  etc.,  it  has  even  absolutely  declined  (17). 
The  greater  the  necessity  of  its  rise,  and  especially  through  the  same 
programme  which  has  made  Holland  and  France  so  rich,  in  spit(;  of 
all  the  wars,  which  at  this  moment  is  followed  by  the  English  against 
France  (24).  The  state  must  prevent  "loss  of  our  best  blof)d,  the 
very  marrow  of  our  strength,  our  good  gold  and  silver,  by  the  million, 
by  purchase  of  useless  wares  from  our  hereditary  enemies." 

It  cannot  be  said  that  Homick  identified  possession  of  money 
with  wealth.  On  the  contrary  he  made  this  definition:  "  The  power 
and  excellence  of  a  land  is  its  surplus  of  gold,  silver,  and  all  other 
things  necessary  or  convenient  for  its  subsistence,  and  so  far  as  pos- 
sible derived  from  its  own  means,  without  dependence  uj)on  others, 
and  including  the  appropriate  cultivation,  use  and  application  of 
the  same"  (9).  Quite  special  worth  must  be  attributed  to  the  inde- 
pendence of  a  land,  which  to  be  sure  can  never  be  complete,  but 
must  always  be  aimed  at  as  an  ideal.  Everything  pertaining  to  the 
thrift  of  a  land  falls  into  two  classes:  Gold  and  silver,  and  indeed 
copper,  "which  in  their  worth  and  use  equal  all  other  things,  and 
on  account  of  their  civic  use  are  in  a  class  by  themselves;"  then  the 
means  of  food,  clothing,  shelter,  etc.  A  land  that  had  only  gold 
and  silver  would  be  rich,  to  be  sure,  but  very  dependent,  since  gold 
and  silver  can  neither  feed  nor  clothe  people.  A  land  that  has  all 
other  things  except  gold  and  silver  is  somewhat  more  independent, 
to  be  sure,  but  yet  not  sufficiently  so,  "because  gold  and  silver  are 
somewhat  necessary  in  the  most  of  human  circumstances,  while  in  the 
rest  they  are  indispensable."  A  land  with  neither  of  the  two  species 
of  goods  in  its  own  resources,  like  Holland  or  Genoa,  is  insecure, 
even  in  the  most  splendid  development  of  its  commerce.  Most 
independent  is  the  land  which  is  rich  in  both  classes  of  goods,  for 
example,  China  (8).  The  comparison  of  gold  with  the  blood  leads 
Homick  to  the  thought  that  the  princely  treasure  may  play  the  role 
of  the  heart  (22).  Yet  he  is  not  consistent.  His  views  on  mining 
and  on  foreign  trade  are  rather  quite  mercantilistic.     "It  were 


132  THE  CAMERALISTS 

better,  no  matter  how  strange  it  may  appear  to  the  ill-informed,  to 
pay  two  Thaler  for  a  ware  if  they  remain  in  the  country,  than  one  if 
it  is  to  leave  the  country"  (9).  It  also  sounds  paradoxical,  but  it 
is  true,  that  mining  should  be  continued  even  when  its  cost  is  much 
in  excess  of  its  output.  "The  outlay  remains  in  the  country;  what 
is  extracted  from  the  earth  remains  not  less  in  the  country."  Accord- 
ingly the  scale  is  as  much  richer  from  the  so-called  Freibauzechen 
as  a  merchant  who  gets  100  per  cent,  on  his  capital  (31). 

Homick  bases  these  views  on  the  difference  between  the  thrift 
of  individuals  and  that  of  countries,  or  as  we  would  say,  between 
private  and  pubUc  economy:  and  he  even  makes  the  fine  obsen'a- 
tion,  somewhat  in  advance  of  his  time,  that  the  so-called  cameral- 
management  (as  we  say,  Finanzwirlhschaft)  is  "particular  manage- 
ment," thus  maintainable  only  on  the  basis  of  the  general  thrift  of 
the  country.  This  latter  is  the  chief  reason  why  the  attention  of  the 
state  to  the  general  thrift  cannot  be  rated  as  a  mere  parergon  of  the 
treasury  (2,  32).* 

Quite  in  the  spirit  of  the  mercantile  system  are  the  "nine  chief 
rules  of  public  economy,"  which  Homick  offers  as  "a  merchant's 
or  cameral  alphabet"  (9):  (1)  Precise  investigation  of  a  land, 
also  through  experiments,  and  full  use  of  its  productive  capacity, 
especially  of  precious  metals;  (2)  transformation  (Verarbeitung) 
in  the  country  itself  of  all  raw  materials  not  fit  for  use  in  their  natural 
state;  (3)  utmost  increase  and  useful  employment  of  population; 
(4)  no  export  nor  useless  hoarding  of  gold  and  silver;  (5)  so  far  as 
possible,  restriction  to  use  of  home  products;  (6)  necessary  foreign 
wares  should  be  exchanged  at  first  hand,  and  not  for  money,  but 
for  home  products,  and  (7)  so  far  as  possible  (they  should  be  bought 
[?])  in  unmanufactured  form;  (8)  greatest  possible  export  of  "super- 
fluous" home  products,  and  preferably  for  gold  and  silver;  (9)  no 
importation  to  be  permitted,  if  enough  of  the  same  goo<ls,  and  of 
tolerable  quality,  can  be  furnished  at  home.* 

'  Vide  the  chapter  on  Schroder,  for  more  explicit  development  of 
essentially  the  same  view. 

»  Roscher  adds  the  note:  "If  we  compare  these  rules  with  the  still 
very  unsystematic  mercantilism  of  a  Bomitz,  a  Besold,  and  a  Klock, 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  BECHER  133 

To  the  author  these  rules  seemed  such  an  obvious  version  of  "eyes 
open  and  hands  ready  to  take  hold,"  that  he  thought  "their  reason- 
ableness must  be  evident  to  cver)'body.  Only  a  peasant  might  not 
be  able  to  understand  them"  (24).  Whoever  contradicts  them, 
sii  nobis  velut  ethnicus  et  publicanus  el  patriae  hostis  (3). 

The  bulk  of  Homick's  book  is  an  attempt  to  furnish  proof  that 
Austria,  more  than  any  other  European  state,  possesses  the  natural 
endowment  for  economic  independence  and  wealth.  It  has  at  once 
productive  veins  of  the  precious  metals  (and  not  so  far  off  as  Spain's !) 
and  abundance  of  the  chief  necessities  of  life  (10-14).  Everything 
to  be  sure  is  still  in  the  highest  degree  undeveloped.  There  is  no 
enterprise  or  venture,  the  richest  natural  treasures  are  allowed  to 
lie  unused,  raw  materials  are  exported  to  be  brought  back  at  doubled 
price  in  manufactured  form,  the  population  is  sparse,  their  luxury 
seeks  mostly  foreign  products,  etc.  (16-18).  Still  the  inhabitants 
are  by  no  means  lacking  in  mental  equipment  for  trade  and  industry 
(15).  It  occurs  here,  as  usual,  that  the  raw  material  countries  are 
poorer  than  those  where  manufactures  flourish,  that  the  former, 
if  they  will,  can  supply  the  lack  "by  proper  use  of  their  raw  materials," 
and  then  can  be  more  secure  than  the  latter  (8).  Hence  there  is 
need  in  Austria  only  of  earnest  grasping  of  the  situation  from  the  high- 
est quarters  down,  and  Hornick  urges  that  this  programme  should 
take  the  form  of  total  prohibition  of  imports  in  case  of  silk,  woolen, 
linen,  and  French  manufactured  articles  (22).  Violations  should 
be  punished  as  treason  (23).  Then,  in  his  judgment,  all  the  incon- 
veniences of  the  transition  period  would  be  passed  in  a  few  years  at 
most.  Many  foreigners,  who  have  hitherto  supplied  our  market, 
will  settle  in  the  country  and  continue  their  industry  (21).  The 
necessary  amounts  of  capital  will  be  created  of  themselves,  through 
discontinuance  of  the  outflow  of  money.  Inordinate  rise  of  prices 
for  domestic  goods  could  be  prevented  by  the  government,  by  estab- 
lishing scales  of  prices  (24). 

Horaick  urges  further  that  artists  and  great  Verleger  should  be 
more  honorably  treated  by  the  state  (28) ;  and  he  argues  that  a  mari- 

who  were  already  acquainted  with  the  great  Italian  mercantilists  Botero 
and  Serra,  we  get  an  idea  of  the  meaning  of  the  practical  impulse  which 
Colbert  also  gave  to  the  theory." 


134  THE  CAMERALISTS 

lime  country  without  naval  strength  cannot  be  powerful;  while 
naval  power  without  sea  commerce  is  impossible  (30).  On  the  utility 
of  means  of  exhibiting  the  resources  of  the  state,  on  the  harm  of  guild 
abuses,  the  classification  of  traders  into  the  publicly  useful  and 
the  harmful,  he  is  quite  in  accord  with  Becher.  Privilegia  private 
are  to  be  regarded  with  suspicion;  their  reasonable  purpose,  namely, 
control  of  consumption  in  the  public  interest,  may  be  better  secured 
through  prohibition  of  imports,  and  then  free  domestic  trade  (28). 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE  CAMERALISTICS  OF  SCHRODER 

The  third  of  the  group  mentioned  in  the  preceding  chapter 
was  Wilhelm  Freyherr  von  Schroder.* 

No  writer  in  the  cameralistic  series  has  been  portrayed  in 
more  conflicting  colors.  On  the  one  hand,  he  has  been  repre- 
sented as  an  oracle  of  cameralistic  vvisdom,  and  a  model  of 
civic  righteousness.  On  the  other  hand,  so  long  as  his  influ- 
ence was  apparent,  equally  extreme  depreciation  of  his  character 
and  doctrines  was  uttered.  This  latter  estimate  is  typified  by 
the  remarks  in  a  private  letter  by  Seckendorfif  (quoted  Ijy 
Roscher,  p.  294).  Speaking  of  Schroder's  book,  Scckendorff 
says:  '* sitUtissimus  liber,  et  pravis  repletus  opinionibus  .... 
a  homine  perversa;  et  hos  tamen  homines  fovent  principesy 

In  a  certain  sense  this  second  type  of  appraisal  of  Schroder 
gives  him  an  importance  which  he  would  not  have  obtained 
if  he  had  always  been  treated  judicially.  In  spite  of  his 
admirers,  he  occupies  on  the  whole  the  place  of  a  suspicious 
character  in  the  literature  of  the  subject.  To  express  it 
melodramatically,  he  is  the  heavy  villain,  whose  shadow  ever 
and  anon  falls  athwart  the  plot.  Even  if  later  writers  do  not 
refer  to  him  by  name,  ideas  which  were  rightly  or  wrongly 
attributed  to  him,  and  which  were  not  indorsed  by  cameralists 
in  general,  constantly  recur.  They  not  only  furnish  many 
texts  on  which  the  cameralists  delivered  homilies  against 
tendencies  to  which  they  might  have  given  the  name  Schroder- 

'  The  title-page  of  the  first  edition  of  Schroder's  chief  work  does 
not  contain  the  author's  name.  It  reads:  Furstliche  Schatz-  und  Rent- 
Cammer,  ad  Augustissimum  6r»  Invictissimum  Imperatorem  Leopoldum 
I.  Principem  Triutnphantem.  Cum  speciali  PrivUegio  Sacr.  Caes. 
Majest.,  ....  1686.  Unless  otherwise  specified,  the  references  are 
to  this  edition.    I  have  also  used  the  edition  of  1744. 

135 


\T,()  THE  CAMERALISTS 

ismus,  but  perversely  enough,  these  more  or  less  imaginary 
faults  of  Schroder  have  come  down  to  our  time  as  peculiarly 
characteristic  of  cameralism.  The  perversion,  the  exaggera- 
tion, the  exception  have  thus  been  reported  as  the  rule.  In 
order  to  reach  an  objective  judgment  of  cameralism,  therefore, 
it  is  necessary  to  form  a  correct  estimate  of  the  man  who  has 
been  used  more  than  any  other  to  prejudice  its  rej^utation. 
With  the  help  of  the  article  by  Marchet,  the  necessary  biblio- 
graphical details  about  Schroder  may  be  summarized.' 

There  has  Ixicn  much  inaccuracy  in  accounts  of  his  life,  especially 
through  confusion  of  his  career  with  that  of  his  father.  The  latter 
represented  Gotha  in  the  negotiations  for  peace  at  Osnabriick  in 
1643.  In  1654  he  took  a  prominent  part  in  the  Diet  at  Augsburg; 
he  became  Kanzler  and  Gekeimrath,  and  died,  1663.  The  younger 
Schroder  with  whom  we  are  concerned,  is  known  only  from  the  time 
of  his  entrance  into  Austrian  service.  Possibly  as  early  as  1663, 
not  later  than  1673,  be  became  a  member  of  the  English  "Academy 
of  Sciences,"  and  he  maintained  rather  intimate  relations  with 
England  throughout  his  life.  One  of  the  faults  in  his  writing  was 
his  failure  precisely  to  indicate  the  English  sources  which  he  freely  used. 

Schroder  succeeded  Becher  as  director  of  the  Manujacturhaus 
at  Vienna.  Becher  had  lost  favor,  partly  because  of  his  irascible 
temper  and  arbitrary  manner,  partly  because  he  was  accused  of 
conducting  his  office  with  an  eye  primarily  to  his  own,  rather  than 
the  public,  interest.  Two  years  before  Becher  was  removed,  Schroder 
was  called  upon  to  make  a  report  to  the  emperor  on  existing  manu- 
facturing conditions  in  Austria,  and  he  took  the  opportunity  to 
make  propositions  about  expanding  industries  and  making  them 
profitable   for  the  treasury.     Marchet  says: 

"  With  Becher  and  Homick,  Schroder  composed  the  triple  con- 
stellation which  from  the  seventh  to  the  ninth  decades  promoted 
the  industrial  advance  of  Germany  and  especially  of  Austria.  I 
should  arrange  the  series  in  the  order  Homick,  Becher,  Schroder. 
They  used  approximately  the  same  means,  viz.,  opposition  to  guild 
abuses,  especially  through  destruction  of  the  guild  monopolies,  and 

t  AU.  d.  Bib.,  in  loc. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SCHRODER  137 

the  establishment  of  a  Manujadur  Haus,  high  tariff  on  foreign 
industrial  products,  especially  French  goods,  the  attainment  of  a 
favorable  balance  of  trade,  etc.  Homick  was  most  aggressive,  and 
did  not  stop  to  think  of  his  own  interests;  Becher  and  Schroder 
acted  more  cautiously,  and  with  more  consideration  for  their  own 
advantage.  The  means  for  attaining  these  purposes  was  for  all 
three  the  absolute  prince.  Schroder  was  in  the  most  advanced  line 
in  this  respect,  and  swayed  between  the  interest  of  the  prince  and  that 
of  the  people  without  a  fixed  point  of  attachment,  although  he  always 
affirmed  that  the  prince  can  be  happy  and  prosperous  only  when  the 
subjects  themselves  are  well  situated.  With  this  conception  of  the 
paramount  character  of  the  princely  power,  Schroder  takes  a  rank 

far  behind  SeckendorfT,  and  occupies  the  standpoint  of  Horn 

In  spite  of  his  subservience  to  princes,  Schroder  must  count  as  one 
of  those  persons  who  helped  to  lift  Germany  from  that  economic 
depression  and  national  decline  into  which  the  Thirty  Years'  War 
and  the  predominance  of  the  territorial  lords  had  plunged  it." 

A  study  of  Schroder's  writings  without  previous  prejudice 
leads  to  conclusions  somewhat  different  from  either  of  those 
cited.     We  shall  try  to  present  a  completely  objective  judgment. 

In  the  first  place,  Schroder  took  the  doctrine  of  divine 
right,  with  an  extremely  absolutistic  interpretation  of  the  right, 
literally,  seriously,  and  as  compared  with  most  of  his  successors, 
consistently.  That  is,  instead  of  clinging  to  the  essential 
doctrine,  while  glossing  it  over  with  all  sorts  of  disguises  to 
conceal  its  extravagance,  Schroder  frankly  accepted  conclusions 
along  with  premises.  On  the  whole,  we  are  bound  to  feel  a 
certain  respect  for  this  rugged  type  of  intellectual  integrity, 
in  contrast  with  the  perplexed  philosophy  which  insists  upon 
primary  theorems  but  balks  at  their  logical  consequences. 

It  would  be  difficult  to  find  in  the  whole  literature  of 
"divine  right"  a  more  compact  and  uncompromising  profes- 
sion of  the  faith  than  in  Schroder's  Disquisitio  Politica  Vom 
absoluten  FurstenrechU     In  substance  his  position  is  this: 

>  Vide  pp.  552-69  of  ist  cd.,  Fiirst.  Schatz-  und  Rent-Cammer. 


138  THE  CAMERALISTS 

II  is  the  common  madness  of  scholars  to  assume  that  all  govern- 
ments, the  monarchical  included,  are  based  upon  certain  compacts 
between  chiefs  or  rulers,  and  their  subjects.  They  assume  that  the 
rulers  are  consequently  bound  to  observe  these  compacts  rigidly. 

For  my  part,  I  fail  to  see  who  shall  have  bound  this  yoke  on  the 
neck  of  monarchical  government,  since  the  same  had  its  beginning 
not  in  a  compact  between  the  prince  and  the  people,  because  Saul 
was  made  king  by  the  immediate  declaration  of  God,  who  also 
caused  him  to  be  anointed  by  his  prophets  before  the  people  knew 
the  least  thing  al>out  it.  Moreover  God  had  the  jura  and  praero- 
galiv  of  this  king  and  his  successors  put  on  pa[;er  and  proclaimed 
and  published  by  the  heralds  (I  Sam.  8:9).  And  in  order  that  such 
jura  might  not  in  the  course  of  time  be  obsolete  or  weakened,  the 
same  had  to  be  put  aside  and  guarded  in  the  archivo  for  the  Lord 
(I  Sam.  10:25).  Moreover  the  Holy  Ghost  himself  was  so  careful 
about  this  whole  matter,  that  with  his  own  fingers  he  wrote  the 
whole  history  and  the  first  origin  of  the  kings,  with  their  rights  and 
prerogatives,  in  the  great  book  of  the  unchangeable  truth  of  God, 
commonly  called  the  Holy  Bible,  and  he  saw  fit  to  substantiate  the 
memory  of  the  same  to  the  end  of  the  world.  Moreover  the  people 
voluntarily  abandoned  all  further  pretensions,  when  God  the  Lord 
ordained  such  Jura  regia,  and  thereby  made  plain  that  when  the 
king  was  once  chosen,  they  would  no  longer  be  heard  (I  Sam.  8: 
18,  19). 

Such  princely  right  now  as  God  dictated  to  the  pen  of  Samuel 
may  l)e  read  in  i)lain  and  clear  words,  namely: 

Details  (Puncta)  of  the  Right  oj  the  Prince^ 

"This  will  Ix;  the  manner  of  the  king  that  shall  reign  over  you: 

"i.   He  will   take  your  sor>s,  and   appoint   them    for  himself, 

for  his  chariots,  anrl  to  l>e  his  horsemen,  and  some  shall  run  before 

his  chariots,  and  he  will  appoint  him  captains  over  thousands,  and 

captains  over  fifties. 

'  Under  this  sub-title  Sfhroder  quotes  I  Sam.  7:11-19  as  a  divine 
cwlo  defining  princely  prerogative  in  general.  The  Lutheran  rendering 
is  even  more  drastic  than  the  King  James  version  in  the  text.  For 
example,  wc  caanol  fail  to  trace  an  ellcct  of  the  Zeitgeist  upon  Luther 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SCHRODER  139 

"2.  He  will  set  them  to  ear  his  ground,  and  to  reap  his  har\-est, 
and  to  make  his  instruments  of  war,  and  instruments  of  his  chariots 

"3.  And  he  will  take  your  daughters  to  be  confcctionaries,  and 
to  be  cooks  and  to  be  bakers. 

"4.  And  he  will  take  your  fields,  and  your  vineyards,  and  your 
oliveyards,  even  the  best  of  them,  and  give  to  his  officers,  and  to  his 
servants. 

"5.  And  he  will  take  the  tenth  of  your  seed,  and  of  your  vine- 
yards, and  give  to  his  officers,  and  to  his  ser\'ants. 

"6.  And  he  will  take  your  menservants,  and  your  maidservants, 
and  your  goodliest  young  men,  and  your  asses,  and  put  them  to  his 
work. 

"7.  He  w^ill  take  the  tenth  of  your  sheep;  and 

"8.  Ye  shall  be  his  servants." 

With  the  puerilities  of  the  exegesis  and  application  we  have 
no  concern,  beyond  recognizing  the  fact  that  Schroder  simply 
voiced  a  certain  contemporary  orthodoxy,  both  in  the  general 
practice  of  grotesque  construction  of  biblical  material  into 
evidence  to  support  preconceptions,  and  in  the  particular 
doctrine  of  the  divine  origin  and  g«a5t-absoluteness  of  princely 
authority.  This  latter  datum  itself,  however,  must  be  put  in 
its  true  relations  with  Schroder's  reasoning,  and  with  cameral- 
ism as  a  whole. 

Schroder  does  not  mince  words  in  stating  his  inferences. 
He  declares  that,  in  consequence  of  Saul's  appointment,  all 
Christian  princes  and  potentates  derive  their  position  and 
right  to  rule  immediately  from  God.  Besides  that,  "most 
princely  governments  and  monarchies"  have  in  the  course  of 
time  "conquered  and  maintained  their  prerogatives  with  the 
sword,  and  I  therefore  see  no  way  in  which  this  contradiction 

in  the  gloss  which  he  forces  upon  the  passage,  thus  turning  the  episode 
from  its  historical  meaning,  by  translating  the  first  sentence:  "Das 
wird  des  Konigs  Recht  sein,  der  iiber  euch  herrschen  wird."  In  the 
quotation  above,  the  King  James  version  is  adapted  to  the  same  liberties 
which  Schroder  takes  with  the  Lutheran  text. 


I40  THE  CAMERALISTS 

that  rulers  are  under  obligation  to  some  one  or  other,  of  which 
the  learned  write,  can  have  any  basis  whatsoever."  The 
author  concedes: 

There  are  few  monarchs  to  be  sure,  who  are  not  involved  in  a 
thousand  Capitulationen,  transactionen,  and  recessen,  but  such 
arrangements  cannot  be  cited  as  a  basis  of  royal  rule.  They  are 
rather  mere  limitations  to  which  rulers  were  compelled  to  consent 
by  force  of  circumstances.  They  can  in  no  sense  be  regarded  as 
subtracting  from  the  right  which  inheres  in  the  royal  office,  and  which 
is  conferred  upon  the  prince  by  God,  not  by  the  people.  They 
cannot  prejudice  the  title  "by  the  grace  of  God,"  since,  as  we  have 
seen,  God  left  the  people  no  freedom  by  which  they  were  entitled 
to  dispute  with  kings,  or  to  hamper  them  with  restrictions.  Con- 
sideration of  misuse  of  royal  power  is  reserved  to  the  divine  majesty, 
and  God  has  already  announced  the  decision  that  the  people's 
complaint  will  be  rejected,  according  to  the  decree  published  by  the 
prophet  Samuel  (I  Sam.  8:i8),  "And  ye  shall  cry  out  in  that  day 
because  of  your  king,  and  the  Lord  will  not  hear  you  in  that  day."' 
Consequently,  although,  through  many  successions,  princes  and 
their  posterity  have  consented  and  sworn  to  many  things,  no  jus 
has  been  thereby  created,  and  no  prince  can  be  bound  thereby,  as 
though  he  had  lost  his  original  divine  right.  Hence  a  sovereign 
prince  is  authorized,  without  violation  of  a  good  conscience,  in 
re-establishing  himself,  so  soon  as  he  has  opportunity,  in  possession 
of  his  princely  right,  in  spite  of  previous  compacts,  oaths,  prescrip- 
tions or  whatever  the  limitations  may  be  called.  This  does  not 
mean  that  a  prince  is  released  in  his  conscience  from  all  laws,  and 
that  he  is  not  bound  as  a  private  person  to  his  private  contracts, 

«  It  is  characteristic  of  this  exegetical  method  that  it  had  no  com- 
punctions about  falsifying  the  very  evidence  on  which  it  relied.  What- 
ever the  bearing  of  the  episode  referred  to,  on  its  face  it  lends  more 
countenance  to  the  social  compact  conception  than  to  Schroder's  inter- 
pretation. It  pictures  the  people  as  taking  the  initiative  in  demanding 
a  king,  and  God  as  reluctantly  acquiescing.  Schroder  not  only  expur- 
gates this  part  of  the  record,  in  his  original  statement,  but  in  this  clinching 
passage  he  omits  the  clause  "which  ye  shall  have  chosen  you,"  which 
would  be  a  sufficient  ad  hominem  argument  to  refute  his  main  contention. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SCHRODER  Mi 

and  that  he  may  at  will  practice  all  sorts  of  tyranny  without  regard 
to  God,  and  justice  and  Christian  love,  for  he  is  a  man  and  has  to 
deal  with  men,  and  like  his  subjects  he  is  a  member  of  the  body  of 
Christ.  In  short,  the  prince  must  have  respect  to  the  rule  {Eph. 
5:9),  "know  that  your  master  is  in  heaven." 

The  prince  must  recognize  two  great  obligations  as  appertaining 
to  his  prerogative;  first,  that  he  must  administer  justice  among  his 
people:  to  wit,  according  to  Christian  love,  and  the  principles  and 
fundamental  doctrines  of  Christianity;  second,  that  he  must  be 
the  leader  of  his  people  in  war,  and  expose  his  body  and  life  to 
defend  them  against  foreign  enemies. 

The  monograph  concludes  with  this  summary: 

These  two  obligations  of  a  prince  are  truly  hard  matters,  since 
a  prince,  without  violation  of  his  conscience,  cannot  disregard  them. 
And  just  as  a  people,  or  the  subjects,  may  under  no  pretext  pre- 
scribe laws  to  their  prince  and  king,  and  as  those  which  are  thu» 
de  facto  made  have  no  validity,  and  do  not  bind  the  prince;  so  on 
the  other  hand  a  prince  must  so  conduct  himself  in  his  government 
that  he  may  be  able  one  day  to  give  account  to  God  alone;  as  David 
says,  "Against  thee,  thee  only,  have  I  sinned"  (Ps.  51:4).  And  a 
prince  must  well  reflect  with  what  a  rigid  law  and  severe  tribunal 
he  must  deal,  where  the  judge  himself  is  the  accuser,  and  his  own 
conscience  must  be  the  witness  against  him,  where  no  exception  and 
no  excuse  can  be  made,  but  where  no  other  penalty  will  be  decreed 
than  eternal  woe,  torture  and  pain. 

In  the  Preface  of  the  Schalz-  und  Rent-Cammer,^  the  rela- 
tions of  the  prince  to  the  state,  and  thus  the  landmarks  of  the 
theory  to  be  expounded  in  the  book,  are  still  more  tersely 
indicated.  Having  recapitulated  the  arguments  of  the  j)ul)- 
licists  on  the  question  how  a  prince  may  best  estal)lish  his 

'  I  refer  to  the  edition  of  1744.  The  Vorrede  does  not  app>ear  in  the 
first  edition.  It  purports  to  have  been  written  by  the  author  of  the 
body  of  the  book,  and  the  fact  that  it  did  not  appear  in  the  original 
edition  is  the  only  reason  I  have  for  suggesting  that  there  is  a  possible 
questiof)  of  authorship.  The  internal  evidence  leaves  little  room  for 
doubt  that  Schroder  was  the  writer. 


T42  THE  CAMERALISTS 

power,  viz.,  he  must  either  (a)  pin  his  hopes  to  the  powerful 
class;  or,  (b)  he  must  make  friends  of  the  masses;  or,  (c)  he 
should  rob  and  plunder,  i.  e.,  he  should  be  a  tyrant;  the  author 
cancels  the  last  theory  from  consideration,  on  the  ground  that 
it  is  essentially  un-Christian,  and  of  the  remaining  two  doctrines 
he  siys: 

Iklwoen  the  twf)  views  it  is  not  for  me  to  decide,  for  each  prince 
wil!  know  Ix'Si  where  to  find  sujjport  in  his  own  case.  For  it  seems 
to  me  ihal  tho.sc  f)eople  are  vcrj'  thoughtless  who  imagine  that  a 
prince  can  rU)  anything  he  pleases  because  he  is  a  prince.  Those 
whr)  talk  in  this  way  do  not  understand  the  difTiculties  of  government. 
Thvy  judge  only  from  outward  appearances.    They  do  not  know 

how  many  small  and  large  wheels  belong  in  a  clock To  cope 

with  these  flifticulties  of  government  the  statesmen  rely  upon  four 
means,  viz.:  (i)  sapientiam  summam  in  constituendo  leges;  (a) 
sninmant  nucloril  item  ul  rliam  vita  religiosa  sil;  (3)  vitae  diumi- 
tdlem;  (4)  bonam  jortunam.  If  I  might  take  the  liberty,  however^ 
I  would  trust  myself  to  hit  the  mark  with  two  arrows:   frst  with 

a  standing  army,  second  with  plenty  of  money  in  the  chest 

The  army  may  be  left  to  others,  but  I  have  undertaken  to  write  in 
ihi.s  little  Ijook  of  the  ways  in  which  a  prince  may  get  money.  I  have 
triken  for  granted  throughout  that  the  interest  of  the  prince  will  be 
join  'd  with  the  interest  of  the  subjects,  and  accursed  be  he  who 
int<-niionally  sef)arates  the  one  from  the  other,  because  they  cannot 
prevail  unless  they  are  united,  and  those  who  rightly  examine  the 
chain  by  which  the  members  of  a  state  are  bound  together  must 
acknowledj^c,  in  accorrlance  with  sound  reason  and  experience, 
thit  the  prosperity  and  wdjare  0}  the  subjects  is  the  foundation  upon 
'.t'hirh  all  happiness  of  a  prince  as  ruler  of  such  subjects  is  based. 
....  The  common  man  is  not  satisfied  with  words.  He  wants 
K<>od  subsistence,  cheap  times  and  protection.  I  have  accordingly 
shown  in  i^encral  all  jK)SsibIe  means  and  ways  by  which  a  prince  may 
make  his  subjects  or  his  land  rich  and  prosjx;rous.  In  order  how- 
evr  that  a  [)rince,  in  exacting  tribute  and  in  ordering  institutions, 
may  make  no  mistake,  I  have  advised  that  he  make  his  demands 
wlu-re  there  is  something  to  take,  and  where  he  who  must  pay  can 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SCHRODER  143 

afford  it.  To  that  end  it  is  necessary  that  a  prince  shall  be  informed 
about  his  land  and  his  subjects,  their  occupations  and  their  gains. 
I  have  accordingly  proposed  the  necessary  schedules. 

Schrbder  is  half  apologetic  about  his  proposals  {Vorrede, 
p.  14)  and  describes  his  book  as  a  Utopia.  Apparently  he  does 
not  use  the  word  in  quite  the  usual  sense.  He  means  by  it 
that  while  his  scheme  does  not  profess  to  correspond  with 
actual  administration  in  Germany,  it  is  on  the  other  hand  not 
impracticable,  and  should  be  set  up  as  an  ideal  to  be  attained. 
He  reiterates  his  general  idea  in  this  way: 

I  think  I  have  shown  how  the  happiness  of  a  prince  is  conjoined 
with  that  of  his  subjects,  and  the  prince  himself  may  be  made  rich 
by  ways  and  means  which  are  opposed  neither  to  God  nor  to  virtue, 
and  that  all  Machiavellian  maxims  which  are  based  upon  jealousies, 
mistrust,  secret  subtle  tricks  for  oppressing  the  subjects,  and  other 
tyrannies,  should  be  avoided  in  all  Christian  governments,  and  in 
their  stead  should  be  introduced,  to  the  advantage  of  both  prince  and 
subjects,  mutual  confidence  and  love  that  would  be  pleasing  to  God 
and  would  give  peace  of  conscience,  and  at  the  last  great  day  of 
judgment  would  obtain  for  prince  and  subjects  the  divine  blessing. 

Those  who,  after  the  common  fashion,  with  Adoram  who  was 
over  the  tribute  of  Rehoboam  (I  Kings,  chap.  la),  arc  accustomed 
to  suck  the  life  blood  of  the  people,  may  scoff  as  they  will,  and  may 
think  to  gain  by  it;  to  me  they  are  like  the  geographers  who  measure 
off  the  whole  world  with  their  circles  on  paper,  without  the  least 
concern  whether  the  surface  of  the  earth  is  made  of  wood  or  straw, 
nor  how  long  it  can  last,  Latronum,  non  pHncipum  est,  omnia  auferre. 
A  robber  strips  off  my  shirt.  A  prince  does  not  even  demand  my 
coat. 

With  this  preliminary  survey  of  SchrSder's  general  con- 
ception of  government,  we  may  attempt  to  do  justice  to  the 
main  argument  of  his  book.  The  opening  passage  was  seized 
upon  by  later  writers  as  containing  a  sinister  meaning,  and 
the  whole  book  was  prejudged  accordingly.  The  paragraph 
reads: 


144  THE  CAMFRALISTS 

A  prince  who  has  no  treasure  in  the  chcsi,  but  |)lans  lo  rely  upon 
the  good  will  of  his  subjects  and  lands,  is  walking  on  stilts:  for  the 
tempers  of  subjects  are  lame  dogs,  with  which  one  can  catch  no 
particular  hares.  Consequently  I  cannot  agree  with  those  publicists 
who  so  far  neglect  care  for  a  full  treasury  and  for  accumulating  a 
common  fund,  that  they  believe,  if  a  prince  only  puts  himself  in  the 
good  graces  of  the  subjects  by  great  lih>erality,  or  by  waiving  all 
gifts,  he  will  always  in  case  of  need  find  abundant  treasure  among 
them. 

Instead  of  finding  a  cause  of  offense  in  this  passage,  the 
historian  who  has  any  sense  of  social  values  must  give  Schroder 
credit  for  wise  prevision  of  the  necessity  of  a  well-defined  fiscal 
administration.  The  German  states  at  his  time  were  not  yet 
fully  through  with  the  process  of  evolution  from  the  household 
to  the  civic  type.  The  publicists  with  whom  Schroder  took 
issue  evidently  preferred  a  regime  of  hand-to-mouth  patri- 
archalism  lo  an  orderly  impersf>nal  system  of  creating  govern- 
mental revenue.  There  was  no  issue  between  the  two  types 
of  theorists  about  the  fundamental  relations  of  prince  and 
subjects.  The  question  was  simply  whether  the  relation 
should  j)nx:eed  upon  the  Vjasis  of  a  sort  of  happy-go-lucky 
plantation  improvidence,  or  whether  there  should  be  an 
attempt  to  antici[)ate  fiscal  needs  by  organizing  an  adequate 
system  of  supplying  governmental  wants.  It  would  be  self- 
stultifying  for  anyone  in  our  generation,  who  believes  neither 
that  the  social  pr(x:ess  should  have  halted  with  the  big-farm 
type  of  rural  civilization,  nor  that  philosophical  anarchism 
pictures  the  structure  best  adapted  to  secure  the  utmost  devel- 
opment of  diversified  civilization,  to  decide  against  Schroder 
and  in  favor  of  his  critics.  If  he  was  a  king-maker,  he  was 
more  a  Samuel  than  a  Warwick.  He  cannot  be  made  respon- 
sible for  the  abuses  of  governmental  power  by  arbitrary  rulers. 
The  things  which  the  people  of  the  period  most  wanted  required 
responsible   and   capable  governments.     These  governments 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SCHRODER  145 

depended  upon  relatively  fixed  sources  of  income.  The 
creation  of  such  sources  of  income  gave  to  rulers  in  turn  power 
to  oppress  the  people.  The  exercise  of  this  power  presented 
problems  with  which  subsequent  stages  of  civic  experience 
had  to  deal.  Meanwhile  it  would  be  hysterical  to  blame 
Scrhoder  for  his  meritorious  work  in  planning  the  sort  of  civic 
machinery  without  which  the  main  purposes  of  the  German 
peoples  of  his  time  could  not  have  been  promoted.  His 
critics  were  of  the  type  who  demand  the  miracle  of  arriving  at 
ends  without  use  of  the  necessary  means.  While  we  cannot 
accept  as  general  truth  all  the  reasons  which  Schroder  assigned 
for  his  dissent  from  the  policy  of  relying  upon  extemporized 
popular  generosity  for  governmental  supplies,  we  must  judge 
them  in  connection  with  the  state  of  opinion  to  which  they  were 
addressed.  In  other  words,  the  whole  issue  between  him  and 
his  critics  resolves  itself  in  the  retrospect  into  balancing  of 
ad  hominem  arguments.  Briefly,  the  issue  reduces  to  this:  a 
yMa«-absolute  ruler  being  by  common  consent  assumed,  and 
quasi-dhsohxit  rulers  being  inclined  to  aggression  upon  other 
states  than  their  own,  thus  constantly  jeopardizing  the  peace 
and  security  of  all  states,  and  each  state  assuming  that  its  own 
ruler  is  more  devoted  to  its  own  interests  than  other  rulers  are, 
is  it  wise  or  not  that  the  ruler  should  have  control  of  regular 
fiscal  resources,  so  that  he  might  act  promptly  and  efficiently 
for  the  general  weal  ?  In  this  connection  it  would  be  irrelevant 
to  criticize  these  premises.  Whatever  their  merits  or  demerits, 
they  were  the  presuppositions  of  all  theorists  who  had  an 
appreciable  influence  upon  the  passage  in  political  experience 
which  we  are  considering.  None  of  the  subsequent  cameral- 
ists  so  much  as  hinted  at  a  theory  of  government  which  essen- 
tially modified  these  assumptions.'     That  being  the  case,  we 

I  I  do  not  mean  that  no  betrayals  of  views  pointing  to  reconsidera- 
tion of  political  philosophy  are  to  be  found  in  the  cameralistic  books. 
Instances  of  contrary  impulses,  if  not  insights,  may  be  found  between  the 


146  THE  CAMERALISTS 

are  bound  to  conclude  that  those  cameralists  who  afifected  to 
regard  Schroder  as  a  wicked  partner  impeached  either  their 
own  mental  competence  or  their  sincerity.  Whatever  room 
there  was  for  diflference  of  opinion  about  details,  we  can  have 
little  respect  for  his  contemporaries,  or  his  successors  for  the 
next  century,  who  failed  to  give  him  credit  for  foresight  and 
service  upon  the  constructive  side  of  the  issue — a  fiscal  system 
vs.  no  system. 

It  has  often  been  repeated  to  Schroder's  discredit,  for 
example,  that  he  made  it  a  part  of  the  right  of  a  prince  to 
prefer  his  own  welfare  to  that  of  his  subjects,  if  they  came  into 
collision.  The  fact  is,  however,  that  not  a  single  man  in  the 
series,  from  Osse  to  Sonnenfels,  ever  stated  a  fundamental 
theorem  about  the  rights  of  rulers  of  which  Schroder's  proposi- 
tion would  not  be  a  consistent  and  necessary  corollary.  Some 
of  them  gave  pathetic  evidence  of  an  unrec(jnciled  contlict 
between  judgment  and  sympathy,  in  opinions  about  specific 
acts  or  types  of  acts.  To  a  modern  man  some  of  these  opinions 
would  be  utterly  irreconcilable  with  an  absolutislic  theory  of 
government.  In  this  connection  the  cameralists  did  not  have 
the  courage  of  their  sympathies,  however,  and  they  held  to 
their  absolutistic  theories  in  general,  while  incontinently  utter- 
ing more  democratic  opinion  about  particulars.  Even  the 
free-thinking  Justi  never  ventured  to  deny  in  jmnt  the  essential 
theorem  which  Schroder  put  in  the  most  uncompromising 
theological  form,  viz.  (p.  7): 

For  that  is  the  rij^ht  of  the  prince  in  the  empire  of  Christ  which 
the  prophet  David  describes,  when  he  says:  "He  has  given  thee  the 
heathen  for  thine  inheritance  and  the  uttemnosl  parts  of  the  earth 
for  ihy  possession,"'  whence  it  is  seen  that  the  prerogative  of  kings 

lines  of  almost  every  one  of  them.  So  far  as  they  were  willing  to  state 
their  basic  presumptions,  however,  the  cameralists  all  adhered  to  sub- 
Mantially  the  view  above  indicated. 

•  •V'^'ain  by  changing  the  tense  from  future  to  past  Schroder  alters  the 
text  just  enough  to  make  it  suit  his  purpose  better  than  the  actual  language 
(F's.  2:8). 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SCHRODER  I47 

is  a  hereditary  riglit  [jus  haereditarium],  that  it  is  a  complete  and 
proprietary  right  [voUig  iind  eigenthmrUich  Rechl],  and  not  as  it  is 
called  by  the  Cromwellians  in  England,  a  royal  office  [officium 
Regium].  It  does  not  say,  "he  has  given  the  heathen  a  king,"  but 
"he  has  given  thee  the  heathen  for  a  possession,"  whereby  the 
absolute  government  of  princes  is  evidently  established.  Accord- 
ingly it  is  impossible  that  the  interest  of  a  prince  will  not  sometimes 

differ   from   the  interest  of  the  people When   therefore  a 

prince,  in  order  to  conserve  his  monarchical,  not  his  private  interests, 
must  often  use  means  not  agreeable  to  the  people,  he  can  in  such 
cases  surely  look  for  little  help  from  them,  and  consequently  it  is 
not  to  be  hoped  that  a  prince  must  rely  upon  his  subjects. ' 

The  discussion  which  follows,  of  the  advantages  of  absolute 
over  limited  monarchy,  differs  in  no  essential  from  the  views 
expressed  at  length,  or  implied,  by  all  the  later  cameralisis. 
It  is  of  course  less  finished  in  form  than  the  identical  philosophy 
a  hundred  years  later,  and  it  has  less  sense  of  shame  to  hide 
under  palliating  phrase.  It  is  more  frank  than  the  same 
doctrine  in  later  and  sophisticated  types,  but  no  more  justly 
chargeable  with  subornation  of  oppression.  The  man  who 
believed  in  the  divine  origin  and  absolute  right  of  kingship, 
and  who  tried  to  show  what  was  necessary  to  sustain  such  an 
institution,  cuts  a  much  more  respectable  figure  in  history  than 
men  who  still  professed  allegiance  to  the  premises  of  the  doctrine 
but  hedged  on  its  conclusions.  Even  a  democrat,  to  whom  the 
dogma  of  the  divine  right  of  kings  is  a  childish  superstition, 
but  who  prefers  logical  consistency  to  mental  confusion,  must 
fmd  something  to  admire  in  the  Bismarckian  ring  of  Schroder's 
ultimatum  (p.  12): 

In  order  now  that  a  prince  may  be  independent  of  his  subjects, 
and  absolute  in  himself,  I  regard  it  as  safest  and  most  profitable  that 

'  Although  this  is  a  literal  rendering,  the  last  sentence  must  be 
understood  as  referring  to  the  alternatives  presented  above,  and  it  means 
"he  cannot  rely  upon  mobilizing  the  good  will  of  his  subjects  whenever 
occasion  demands,  but  must  have  a  regular  system  of  revenue." 


148  THE  CAMERALISTS 

he  should  have  the  hilt  in  his  hand  and  money  in  his  chest,  whereby 
he  may  put  his  demands  into  effect,  and  prostitute  neither  himself 
nor  his  reputation,  nor  be  obliged  to  put  his  subjects  off  with  fine 
words,  Ijecause  he  is  unable  to  act  from  lack  of  means.  As  Demos- 
thenes said,  ''Opus  sunt  opes."  ....  With  gold  and  silver  we 
can  work  miracles. 

If  we  fairly  consider  the  civic  problems  of  German  states 
in  the  second  half  of  the  seventeenth  century,  and  if  we  give 
Schroder  the  benefit  of  his  own  explanations,  we  can  no  more 
join  with  those  who  treat  him  as  the  black  sheep  of  the  camera- 
listic  flock  than  we  can  pass  a  similar  judgment  upon  Alexander 
Hamilton  for  trying  to  lay  a  firm  foundation  for  American 
finance.  On  the  contrary,  we  must  number  him  among  the 
sane  and  wise  builders  upon  the  structure  of  German  fiscal 
administration.  His  second  chapter,  on  the  directorate  of  the 
income  of  a  reigning  prince,  begins  with  a  keen  analysis  of  the 
prevalent  unwisdom  of  European  governments  in  committing 
both  disbursements  and  the  creation  of  revenues  to  the  Camtner. 
The  consequence  is,  according  to  Schroder,  that  when  the 
prince  needs  money,  the  tradition-bound  Cammer  knows  no 
other  way  than  to  hunt  out  some  new  objects  on  which  a  tax 
has  not  been  levied;  or  to  grant  some  new  monopoly;  thus 
cauang  the  subjects  to  sweat  blood  because  more  of  their 
support  is  taken  away;  or  to  exact  a  new  loan;  or  to  demand 
the  ox  that  has  grown  fat  while  working  on  the  lord's  estate; 
or  to  sell  the  claim  to  some  future  lucrative  service  for  a  large 
sum  of  money,  or  some  such  device.  By  these  means  the 
cameralists  have  made  themselves  so  hated  and  suspected  in 
the  land  that  they  have  frequently  been  excluded  from  assem- 
blies of  the  estates.  "Moreover,"  continues  Schroder,  "this 
point,  so  far  as  I  know,  has  never  been  touched.  I  must  there- 
fore dwell  ufKm  it,  and  express  my  unauthoritative  opinion 
about  it."  The  substance  of  this  expanded  opinion  is  that 
raising  the  princely  revenues  calls  for  quite  other  persons  and 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SCHRODER  149 

talents  from  those  engaged  in  the  work  of  disbursement. 
Schroder  accordingly  elaborates  work  for  a  comprehensive 
system  of  Policey,  although  it  is  not  as  definitely  classified  under 
that  title  as  in  most  of  the  other  cameralists,  and  he  does  not 
draw  sharp  distinctions  between  measures  that  other  writers 
distribute  between  ^^ Handlung,^^  ^^ Policey, ^^  and  "Finanz"^ 
A  glance  at  Schroder's  table  of  contents  would  disclose  that 
he  was  interested  in  a  wide  range  of  industrial  development, 
which  would  make  both  prince  and  people  richer.  He  simply 
concludes  (p.  21): 

It  consequently  seems  highly  necessary  that  cameral  affairs, 
at  present  so  called,  should  be  divided  into  two  separate  Collegia, 
the  one  of  which,  as  aforesaid,  should  have  the  income  and  the  dis- 
bursements, the  other  should  be  a  Collegium  which  should  have 
nothing  else  to  do  but  to  raise  the  revenues  of  the  reigning  prince. 

The  remainder  of  the  book  is  devoted  to  showing  the 
different  kinds  of  work  which  such  a  bureau  could  do. 

As  Schroder  saw  the  situation,  the  treasury  officials,  from 
preoccupation,  or  ignorance,  or  both,  rather  than  from  evil 
intentions,  were  effective  smotherers  of  new  industrial  ventures 
An  independent  organization  should  therefore  be  established 
by  the  prince,  with  the  special  duty  of  attending  to  the  very 
enterprises  for  which  the  treasury  had  no  competence.  More- 
over this  Collegium  ought  not  to  be  hampered  by  other  bureaus. 
Hence  it  is  properly  to  be  called  '^sumtnum  6r*  ahsolutum 
Collegium.''^  The  members  should  have  large  salaries,  in 
order  that  they  need  not  be  forced  by  their  own  pecuniary 
necessities  to  prefer  their  private  interests  to  those  of  the  prince. 
Moreover  a  certain  fund  should  be  at  the  disp)osal  of  this 
Collegium,  so  that  it  might  carry  out  its  plans  (p.  23).  Schroder 
cites,  as  an  illustration  of  what  he  has  in  mind,  the  '^Courts  of 
augmentations  of  the  revenues,  of  the  King^s  crowone^'  (27 
Hen.  Vni).     He  anticipates  opposition  to  the  plan  on  the  part 

<  E.  g.,  Sonnenfels.     Vidt  pp.  481  ff.  below. 


150  THE  CAMERALISTS 

of  the  existing  court  functionaries,  but  he  sees  promise  of 
accomplishing  the  establishment  of  the  proposed  bureau  in  the 
beginnings  made  "some  years  ago"  by  a  minister,  who  is  not 
named,  but  presumably  an  Austrian  official,  whose  untimely 
death  j)ostponed  the  undertaking. 

The  only  plausible  hypothesis  which  remains  to  account 
for  Schroder's  dubious  reputation  among  the  cameralists  is 
that  the  reactionary  officials  set  a  fashion  of  misrepresenting 
his  proposals.  A  reader  of  the  present  day,  who  should  examine 
his  book  without  knowing  the  worst  that  had  been  said  about 
it,  would  pronounce  the  author  first  and  foremost  a  zealot  for 
establishing  a  stable  fiscal  system,  but  at  the  same  time,  and 
with  practically  equal  earnestness,  a  champion  of  popular 
interests  against  official  greed.  The  argument  is,  in  the  first 
place,  a  most  judicial  analysis  of  the  workings  of  previous 
systems  of  taxation.  Schroder  admits  that  the  traditional 
forms  of  taxation  are  necessary,  and  that  in  extreme  cases  the 
rate  of  the  same  must  be  temporarily  raised.  He  declares  that 
they  arc  inadccjuate  for  the  needs  of  the  state,  and  that  they 
can  never  be  apf)lied  with  impartial  justice  (pp.  29  ff.).  The 
peof)le  who  rely  on  them  are  simply  like  tenants  of  the  soil, 
whose  only  interest  is  to  strip  it,  regardless  of  those  who  must 
depend  on  it  for  their  living  afterward. 

This  is  well  illustrated,  in  the  case  of  artisans,  by  the  closing 
paragraph  of  chap.  xcii.  The  subject  under  discussion  is  the 
reasons  for  the  deplorable  depression  in  German  manufactures. 
The  last  reason  assigned  is: 

....  the  greed  of  the  ruling  classes  and  the  consequent  bad  treat- 
ment of  laborers  and  artisans.  For  no  sooner  does  a  foreign  or 
even  a  native  handicraftsman  by  his  science,  and  art,  in  the  sweat 
of  his  brow,  earn  a  belter  piece  of  bread  than  others  can  ordinarily 
gain,  than  the  government  falls  on  him  like  crows  on  garbage,  and 
tries  to  take  all  it  can.  Tor  it  says  such  a  fellow  ought  not  to  have 
more.     He  should  know  that  he  owes  his  earnings  to  me  as  his  ruler, 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SCHRODER  151 

who  favors  his  trade.  He  should  divide  with  me.  Oh  I  the  great 
foolishness  of  such  magistracies !  They  have  no  idea  what  it  means 
to  have  prosf)erous  subjects.  All  that  they  accomplish  is  to  drive 
such  people  out  of  the  country,  and  at  the  same  time  to  prevent 
others  from  entering. 

In  the  chapter  on  "Saving  as  the  Second  Customary  Dei  ice 
for  Enriching  the  Treasury,^*  Schroder  shows  that  he  had 
thought  much  ahead  of  most  of  his  comtcmporaries  in  tracing 
out  certain  economic  relations.  His  exposition  of  the  false 
economy  of  hoarding  leaves  nothing  to  be  said  on  the  essential 
principle,  and  his  exposure  of  the  penny-wise  and  the  i)ound- 
foolish  policies  of  certain  penurious  types  of  officials  is  as 
merciless  as  it  is  just.  Incidentally  Schroder  cites  an  unnamed 
"world-renowned  publicist"  who  blames  the  untimely  parsi- 
mony of  a  treasury  chief,  and  adds  that  he  "should  distinguish 
between  Oeconomiam  Rusticam  6r*  Oeconomiam  Politicam.^' 
The  latter  phrase  is  notable  as  apparently  anticipating  the 
nineteenth-century  conception  of  economic  science.  The 
context  shows,  however,  that  the  expression  must  not  be  taken 
in  its  full  modem  sense.  It  apparently  connoted  only  an 
undefined  perception  that  rural  management  could  not  be 
taken  in  all  respects  as  a  model  for  civic  management.  This 
part  of  the  argument  concludes  with  the  resume: 

Although  frugality  is  a  great  virtue,  it  should  be  exercised  with 
a  certain  discretion,  and  indeed  with  a  prudentia  politica.  Other- 
wise it  will  be  called  greed  or  senseless  miserliness.  If  it  is  greed, 
it  is  the  root  of  all  evil  and  misfortune,  and  is  more  destructive  than 
all  prodigality.  If  it  is  unreasoning  miserliness,  not  only  the  reputa- 
tion of  the  prince,  but  also  his  interests  will  be  sacrificed,  for  always  to 
take  from  the  country,  and  in  turn  to  consume  nothing,  makes  the 
land  waste  and  barren,  the  subjects  useless,  and  consequently  the 
prince  poor  instead  of  rich  (p.  39). 

The  argument  turns  at  once  to  an  aspect  of  the  .situation 
which  has  greater  interest  for  its  connection  with  another 


152  THE  CAMERALISTS 

element  in  cameralism,  viz.,  the  so-called  mercantilist  theory, 
of  which  more  must  be  said  later.     The  author  continues: 

Sound  judgment  shows  also  that  when  a  prince  without  great 
reason  takes  much  money  from  his  subjects,  and  locks  it  in  his  chest, 
and  guards  it  as  a  treasure,  both  prince  and  land  must  finally  be 

ruined    and    imf)ovcrishcd The  result  would  be  that  the 

country  would  be  stripped  of  money  to  fill  the  chest  of  the  prince, 
anri  thai  not  a  Groschen  would  be  left  for  him  to  take  from  the  country 
as  revenue.  This  would  be  reckoning  without  the  host.  Whence 
it  follows  that  if  money,  which  is  the  pendulum  of  the  state,  which 
brings  all  inequality  in  the  life  of  the  state  [Handel  und  Wandd\ 
into  regular  movement,  is  lost,  commerce  must  collapse,  and  the 
people  must  become  poor  and  needy,  and  because  the  means  [Ver- 
nuigen]  of  the  country  mu.st  then  grow  only  from  the  soil,  the  fraction 
of  the  people,  however,  who  really  support  themselves  from  the  soil 
and  its  produce  is  always  the  smallest  and  poorest  portion  [Haufjen] 
in  a  country,  the  majority  of  the  inhabitants  of  the  country,  from 
lark  of  sup[K)rt,  will  depart,  and  there  will  remain  a  barren  land  and 
a  |KK)r  prince;  for  although  the  prince  has  all  that  money  stored 
in  his  chest,  and  alone  preserves  what  was  otherwise  divided  among 
so  many,  he  still  cannot  be  called  a  rich  prince,  although  he  is  called 

a  rich   man For  common    people   are    rich   in  money:    a 

prince,  however,  is  to  be  regarded  as  rich  only  when  he  has  rich 
subjects  (pp.  42  fl.).  j^j 

This  last  passage  calls  for  further  preliminaries  on  the 
subject  of  mercantilism.  In  no  respect  has  tradition  so  grossly 
failed  to  understand  the  cameralists  of  the  books,  in  distinction 
from  the  cameralists  of  the  bureau,  as  in  this  connection.  The 
cameralism  of  the  bureau  was  a  policy  with  reference  to  the 
paramount  interests  of  the  f)rincely  treasury.  The  cameralism 
of  the  books  was  a  theory  and  a  technology  of  government, 
with  the  neefls  of  the  treasury  taken  for  granted  as  the  norm 
of  judgment. 

It  would  l>e  useless  to  question  the  notorious  fact  that  the 
fK)licy  called  mercantilism  prevailed  in  Germany  during  the 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SCHRODER  153 

cameralistic  period.  It  would  be  fatuous  to  question  the 
equally  familiar  fact  that  promotion  of  commerce,  with  cal- 
culation upon  a  favorable  balance  of  trade,  was  the  most 
prominent  factor  in  this  mercantilist  policy.  It  would  be  quite 
futile  to  question  the  further  fact  that  the  cameralists  of  the 
books  were  virtually  unanimous  in  approving  this  policy. 
Our  interpretation  must  take  issue  with  tradition,  first,  uj)on 
the  precise  meaning  of  this  mercantilist  policy,  and,  second, 
upon  the  place  which  the  policy  occupied  within  the  whole 
cameralistic  theory  of  politics. 

In  the  first  place,  then,  mercantilism  was  a  jjolicy,  not  a 
philosophy.  Speaking  for  the  cameralists  of  the  books  only, 
because  this  investigation  does  not  go  into  the  evidence  about 
the  cameralists  of  the  bureaus,  there  was  a  political  philosophy 
after  its  kind  within  which  the  policy  had  its  setting;  but  the 
interpretation  of  mercantilism  as  a  philosophy  has  the  marks 
of  a  fixed  idea  in  the  modern  literature  of  the  subject,  and  that 
interpretation  is  sheer  misrepresentation  of  the  cameralistic 
theorists.  The  most  urgent  problem  which  the  cameralists 
had  to  solve  was  that  of  raising  revenues  for  the  prince.  In 
their  judgment,  the  line  of  least  resistance,  in  cases  where  it  was 
practicable  at  all,  was  through  development  of  commerce. 
Almost  all  the  literary  cameralists,  consequently,  put  more 
emphasis  on  the  fiscal  importance  of  a  favorable  trade  balance 
than  upon  any  other  single  factor  in  governmental  calculation. 
Incidentally,  their  arguments  treated  money  in  a  way  which 
it  has  proved  very  easy  to  distort  into  a  dogma  that  money  is 
the  only  wealth.  They  no  more  believed,  nor  intended  to 
assert  this,  than  writers  on  the  financial  pages  of  today's 
newspapers  believe  and  assert  that  the  bank  balances  of  the 
money  centers  are  the  only  wealth  of  the  world.  There  is 
rather  more  prima-facie  evidence  that  the  congressional  and 
other  debaters  of  the  Aldrich-Fowler-Vreeland  propositions 
believed  in  1908  that  an  "emergency  currency"  is  the  only 


154  THE  CAMERALISTS 

wealth,  or  that  the  political  economists  of  the  United  States 
since  the  Civil  War  have  believed  that  a  protective  tariff  is  the 
only  means  of  creating  wealth,  than  there  is  to  warrant  the 
historical  fiction  that  the  German  mercantilistic  theorists  held 
gold  and  silver  to  be  the  only  wealth. 

In  fact,  not  one  of  the  cameralists  generalized  the  concept 
"wealth"  much  more  than  the  ordinary  man  on  the  street  does 
today  when  he  uses  the  phrase  "making  money."  To  make 
the  term  Reichthum,  as  it  was  used  by  the  cameralists,  equiva- 
lent to  the  term  wealth  in  nineteenth-century  abstract  political 
economy,  is  an  arrant  anachronism.  The  term  was  virtually 
a  synonym  of  the  more  technical  cameralistic  phrase,  hereitestes 
Vermogen,  or  "ready  means."  Instead  of  giving  to  gold  and 
silver  the  final  and  paramount  place  which  tradition  makes 
the  cameralists  assign  to  them,  these  thinkers  were  rather 
remarkably  clear  in  treating  them  as  means  to  happiness,  and 
under  the  circumstances  the  most  decisive  means,  but  they 
did  not  raise  the  larger  and  deeper  problem.  The  whole 
cameralistic  experience  was  an  unconscious  preparation  for  the 
abstract  question.  What  is  wealth  ?  It  was  a  progressively 
searching  analysis  of  the  sources  from  which  the  people  of  a 
state  may  procure  the  means  of  subsistence,  and  thus  be  in  a 
f>osition  to  turn  a  part  of  the  output  of  their  gainful  occupations 
into  treasure  for  the  support  of  government.  The  inquiry 
was  on  the  whole  so  concrete  in  its  impulse  that  there  was  no 
apparent  tendency  to  extend  abstraction  beyond  the  range  of 
practical  transactions.  Schroder  is  nearer  than  most  of  the 
cameralists  to  the  concept  "wealth"  in  Adam  Smith's  sense, 
however,  when  he  uses  the  term  surplus  {U eherfluss) .  Thus 
chap.  Ixviii  begins  with  the  paragraph: 

Respecting  the  surplus,  whence  it  is  derived,  the  same  consists 
either  in  rebus  naturalibus,  or  rebus  artificialibus,  that  is,  first,  it 
comes  from  the  natural  fertility  of  the  land;  or,  second,  from  the 
diligence  of  the  men  which  we  make  use  of  in  trade  when  we  bring 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SCHRODER  155 

something  from  one  place,  and  sell  it  to  advantage  in  another  place 
and  thus  make  trade  in  all  sorts  of  foreign  wares  in  our  country; 
or  third,  from  the  art  of  men,  which  is  included  under  the  general 
title  manufactures,  each  of  which  must  be  treated  in  particular. 

Developing  the  idea  of  the  former  source  of  "surplus," 
chap.  Ixx  proceeds  in  this  vein: 

Since  then  so  much  depends  upon  the  fertility  of  the  land,  a 
prince  should  pay  good  heed  to  the  Curam  Rei  RusHcae,  in  order 
that  the  land  may  be  well  cultivated,  and  the  inhabitants  may  not 
only  derive  from  it  their  food  and  drink  but  also  something  to  sell. 
....  By  agriculture  (sic)  is  to  be  understood  not  merely  that  which 
serves  for  eating  and  drinking,  but  also  the  other  things  that  grow 
out  of  the  earth  and  belong  to  manufactures  or  to  trade. 

The  proposition  is  elaborated  by  citations  of  the  experience 
of  other  countries,  by  specification  of  particular  products, 
which  are  profitable  articles  of  cultivation,  by  reference  to  the 
book  Oesterreich  uber  alles^  for  additional  particulars,  and  by 
special  emphasis  upon  silk-culture  {Seiden-Oeconomie)  as 
likely  to  be  as  valuable  to  Germany  as  it  had  already  begun 
to  be  to  France.  The  paramount  factor  in  the  calculation, 
namely,  the  conversion  of  resources  into  ready  means,  reap- 
pears in  the  summary  (§xii): 

Here,  as  in  the  case  of  all  other  surplus  which  we  desire,  this 
principle  is  to  be  observed,  that  the  same  shall  be  sought  in  products 
which  our  neighbors  need,  and  which  we  can  best  and  with  greatest 
gain  convert  into  money.  Otherwise  the  surplus  is  of  no  advantage 
to  us,  but  is  often  even  harmful,  since  from  the  same  an  abuse  of  the 
same  may  arise.* 

I  Vide  p.  1 29. 

'  The  discussion  then  passes  to  certain  political  considerations  which 
should  govern  the  policy  of  states  with  respect  to  promotion  of  specific 
kinds  of  cultivation.  The  necessary  methods  of  promoting  trade,  and 
the  value  of  the  same  as  a  source  of  "surplus"  are  discussed  in  chaps. 
Ixxi-lxxix,  and  the  subject  of  manufactures  as  means  of  procuring  a 
"surplus"  is  treated  in  chaps.  Ixxxviii-cv. 


156  THE  CAMERALISTS 

Schroder  must  be  given  credit  for  dealing  with  the  rela- 
tively concrete  problem  of  putting  to  most  discreet  use  the 
opportunities  at  hand  for  acquiring  ready  means.  He  must 
not  be  judged  as  though  he  had  anticipated  a  century  and  had 
devoted  himself  to  the  underlying  problem  of  wealth  in  general. 
In  the  rough,  the  same  proposition  applies  to  all  the  cameral- 
ists  included  in  this  study.  To  confirm  this  in  the  case  of 
Schroder,  we  must  notice  one  of  the  passages  which  the  tradi- 
tional interpreters  of  cameralism  always  find  a  conclusive 
pnxjf-text,  viz.,  chap.  xxix.  The  title  reads:  "Whence  a 
Prince  May  Learn  Whether  His  Country  Is  Gaining  or  Losing 
in  Riches"  (Reiclithum).  Now  it  would  be  a  waste  of  time 
to  defend  the  chapter  against  the  charge  of  superficiality, 
if  philosophical  economists  should  prefer  the  charge.  The 
whole  aim  of  the  cameralists  was  on  the  superficial  plane  of 
practical  efficiency,  not  on  the  deeper  level  of  economic  philos- 
ophy. Their  problem  was  the  development  of  a  programme 
which  would  supply  the  prince  with  ready  means.  The  general 
tendency  of  thought  which  Schroder  represented,  and  in  wliich 
presently  all  the  cameralists  more  or  less  consciously  joined, 
assumed  that  ready  means  for  the  prince  either  caused  or  was 
caused  by  ready  means  for  the  peo])le.  Without  analyzing 
these  alternative  phases  of  the  idea,  we  must  allow  Schroder 
to  speak  for  his  own  practical  interest,  and  must  not  hold  him 
to  account  for  the  meaning  which  his  words  might  have  if  he 
were  discussing  Adam  Smith's  j)roblem  of  the  sources  of  wealth 
in  general.  When  the  modem  railroad  j>resident  studies  the 
problem  of  increasing  the  net  earnings  of  his  road,  he  may  use 
language  which  hypercriticism  could  distort  into  exjjressions 
of  belief  that  freight  charges  are  the  ultimate  sources  of  wealth. 
No  one  would  take  seriously  an  attempt  to  prove  that  a  rail- 
road president  could  see  no  farther,  if  he  should  turn  from 
practical  business  to  economic  theory.  The  cameralists  were 
not  interested  in  wealth  as  a  general  concept,  but  they  were 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SCHRODER  157 

intensely  interested  in  ready  means  as  an  efficient  tool  for 
everyday  purposes.  It  goes  without  saying  that  their  theories 
would  have  been  much  more  adequate  if  they  had  gone  deeper 
into  economic  philosophy;  but  our  present  purpose  is  to  rescue 
ourselves  from  the  errors  of  that  tradition  which  has  treated 
them  as  though  they  did  pry  into  that  antecedent  philosophy 
and  consequently  propounded  fantastic  doctrines.  The  expres- 
sions which  have  been  distorted  into  the  dogma  that  gold  and 
silver  are  the  only  wealth  are  no  more  properly  liable  to  that 
construction  than  our  railroad  presidents'  judgment  that  more 
freight  is  necessary  for  more  dividends  could  fairly  be  con- 
strued into  the  dogma  that  freight  rates  are  the  only  source 
of  wealth.    Schroder  says: 

By  the  different  gainful  occupations  [Handd  und  Wandel]  in  the 
country  a  couniry  supports  itself,  to  be  sure,  and  becomes  powerful 
[mdchtig],  but  it  does  not  necessarily  thereby  increase  in  riches 
[Reichthum;  that  is,  in  the  sense  of  "ready  means"].     For  such 

traffic  with  itself  can  properly  be  called  only  a  commutation 

Hence  the  country  becomes  richer  only  in  the  degree  in  which 
money  and  gold  are  brought  into  the  land  either  from  the  earth, 
or  from  some  other  source,  and  poorer  in  the  degree  in  which 
money  leaves  the  country.  For  since  by  common  consent  of  nations 
gold  and  silver  are  the  universal  price  of  all  things,  and  the  value 
of  the  same  is  everywhere  in  the  world  reckoned  according  to  the 
value  of  gold  and  silver,  for  which  everything  can  be  bought,  we 
must  estimate  the  riches  of  a  country  according  to  the  quantity  of 
the  gold  and  silver  in  the  same.  Hence  we  shall  name  in  order  the 
means  by  which  a  land  acquires  riches,  and  then  those  practices 
through  which  a  land  becomes  poorer,  in  order  that  a  prince  may 
promote  the  former  and  obstruct  the  latter  (chap.  xxix). 

The  present  argument  is  by  no  means  an  attempt  to  prove 
that  the  cameralists  had  thought  out  precise  economic  concepts. 
They  most  certainly  had  not.  It  is  absurd,  however,  to  hold 
them  responsible  for  use  of  certain  terms  in  the  exact  technical 
sense  fixed  upon  them  much  later,  and  thus  by  forcing  an 


158  THE  CAMERALISTS 

arbitrary  interpretation  into  their  concepts  to  convict  them  of 
errors  of  which  they  were  innocent.  It  is  in  principle  as  unjust 
to  the  cameralists  to  infer  from  such  language  as  that  just 
quoted  that  they  regarded  gold  and  silver  as  the  only  wealth, 
as  it  would  be  to  interpret  writers  in  the  London  Statist  as 
believing  that  the  bank  balances  are  the  only  wealth,  while 
com  and  cotton  and  iron  are  not  wealth.  Schroder  was  talking 
about  the  species  of  wealth  which  presented  the  most  immediate 
problems  to  men  who  were  primarily  interested  in  supplying 
the  treasury.  The  very  fact  that  he  prefaced  the  passage  with 
the  reservation  about  the  occupations  by  which  the  country 
supports  itself  and  makes  itself  powerful  shows  that  his  appar- 
ent error  about  what  is  wealth  and  what  is  not  is  largely  a 
verbal  matter.  Not  having  thought  through  the  concept 
denoted  by  the  English  technical  term  "wealth, "  he  used  a  word 
{Reichthum)  which  we  most  naturally  translate  "wealth"  for 
the  one  species  of  wealth  in  which  he  was  peculiarly  interested. 
Thereupon  we  charge  him  with  identifying  his  specific  con- 
cept, most  justly  represented  by  the  phrase  "ready  means," 
with  the  generic  concept  "wealth,"  which  he  had  never  found 
occasion  to  use  at  all. 

Nor  is  our  argument  an  attempt  to  show  that  Schroder, 
and  the  cameralists  in  general,  actually  had  a  perspective 
of  the  relation  of  "ready  means"  to  other  wealth,  which  ade- 
quately generalized  the  facts  for  all  times  and  places.  They 
certainly  had  not.  The  point  to  be  made  is  that  we  must 
abandon  the  myth  that  they  attempted  such  generalization. 
They  were  not  economists  in  the  nineteenth-century  sense. 
They  were  political  theorists  dealing  incidentally  with  rela- 
tively concrete  fragments  of  economic  relations.  Those 
fragments  called  for  generalization  later.  Meanwhile  the 
cameralists  must  be  interpreted  by  the  conditions  of  the  exact 
technical  task  which  they  proposed,  not  by  the  conditions  of 
the  subsequent  philosophical  task  which  they  did  not  propose. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SCHRODER  159 

It  is  very  true  also  that  Schroder  did  practically  nothing 
to  develop  the  theory  of  extractive  industries.  This  fact  has 
been  cited  against  him  over  and  over  again.  It  has  been 
interpreted  to  mean,  first,  that  he  did  not  regard  agricultural 
products  as  "wealth;"  second,  that  he  had  no  sympathy  with 
the  agricultural  population,  and  did  not  care  how  miserable 
its  condition  might  be.  However  this  misrepresentation  of 
Schroder  may  have  come  into  circulation,  a  historian  who 
should  today  assert  that  his  book  confirmed  this  judgment 
would  thereby  prove  either  that  he  had  not  read  it  (e.  g.,  the 
passages  cited  above,  pp.  152  flf.)  or  that  he  was  incapable  of 
reading  it  understandingly. 

In  the  face  of  his  explanation  above  (p.  142)  Schroder 
might  as  properly  be  accused  of  caring  nothing  for  an  army  as 
a  governmental  recourse.  The  task  which  Schroder  undertook, 
in  the  volume  upon  which  his  reputation  chiefly  rests,  was 
not  unlike  that  which  Professors  Winthrop  M.  Daniels  and 
Henry  C.  Adams  had  in  mind  when  they  wrote  their  books. 
The  Elements  of  Public  Finance,  and  The  Science  of  Finance. 
Because  neither  of  these  modern  authors  included  in  his 
volume  on  finance  a  treatise  on  the  improvement  of  agriculture, 
it  has  occurred  to  no  one  that  they  should  be  accused  of  omitting 
agriculture  from  the  sources  of  wealth,  or  of  heartlessness 
toward  the  agricultural  population.  The  charge  is  equally 
absurd  in  the  case  of  Schroder.  He  evidently  knew  much 
less  about  details  of  agricultural  conditions  on  the  operative 
side  than  the  majority  of  the  cameralists.  So  far  as  he  betrays 
his  state  of  mind  on  the  subject,  he  seems,  it  is  true,  to  have  had 
no  idea  that  much  could  be  expected  in  the  way  of  improving 
agriculture.  Indeed  he  expressly  says  as  much  of  manu- 
factures and  commerce,  and  by  implication  of  agriculture,  at 
the  close  of  chap.  Ixix : 

For  the  fertility  of  a  country  brings  about  cheapness  of  living, 
which  is  the  spirit  of  all  trade,  and  for  the  reason  that  cheapness  in 


l6o  THE  CAMERALISTS 

eatinj;  and  drinking  causes  cheap  wages  for  labor,  and  consequently 
makes  manufactures  and  wares  cheap,  so  that  they  can  be  sold  at  a 
lower  price  than  others  offer,  and  hence  the  market  can  be  held  by 
underbidding  others,  because  everything  follows  after  cheapness. 
From  the  examples  cited  is  to  be  seen  what  Austria  could  do,  and 
how  rich  and  powerful  it  could  be  if  through  a  good  Policey  it  would 
combine  the  surplus  of  nature,  with  which  more  than  all  other  lands 
in  the  wide  world  it  is  endowed,  with  the  diligence  of  men,  and 
through  establishment  of  splendid  manufactures  and  commerce 
would  apply  the  bounty  of  nature  to  its  profit.  Details  on  this 
subject  are  to  be  found  in  the  little  book,  OesUrreich  iiber  alles  wenn 
es  nur  will.  I  despair  of  anything  adequate  in  manufactures  and 
commerce  in  this  country  however.  My  reasons  I  have  resolved 
to  set  forth  in  a  special  tract  entitled  Oesterreichs  entdeckte  Wunden. 

At  the  beginning  of  chap,  xcii  Schroder  declares  explicitly 
that  Germany  has  both  the  materials  and  the  skill  to  excel 
England,  France,  Holland,  and  Italy  in  manufactures,  if  the 
will  were  only  present.  With  reference  to  agriculture  as  a 
source  of  revenue,  he  was  not  so  wrong  as  to  general  theory 
as  he  was  incredulous  about  feasibility  of  improving  prevailing 
conditions.  This  would  in  part  explain  away  the  traditional 
inferences  from  such  a  passage  as  the  following  (chap.  Ixxxviii): 

The  third  surplus  comes  from  manufactures,  and  the  latter,  if 
conjoined  with  commerce,  must  be  much  preferred  to  the  fertility 
of  the  soil,  whence  we  see  that  unfertile  countries  where  manufac- 
tures and  commerce  flourish  are  richer  than  the  fertile  countries, 
which  have  no  manufactures.  The  matter  is  in  itself  as  clear  as 
the  sun.  If  we  appraise  a  pound  of  iron  in  the  mine  where  it  origi- 
nates, it  will  have  very  little  value.  If  however  a  watchmaker  or 
similar  skilled  laborer  takes  this  pound  of  iron  in  his  hand  and  works 
it  according  to  his  art,  the  pound  of  iron  is  worth  a  hundred  times 
as  much  as  before,  etc.,  etc. 

It  would  be  difficult  to  find  in  modem  political  economy 
a  basis  for  impeachment  of  the  essential  conceptions  involved 
in    such    language.    Schroder    plainly    underestimated    the 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SCHRODER  i6i 

relative  importance  of  the  extractive  industries;  but  this  was 
less  from  misconception  of  their  fundamental  nature  than  from 
overestimate  of  the  subsequent  processes  of  securing  ready 
means  which  the  endowment  of  nature  made  possible,  and 
especially  from  belief  that  it  would  be  relatively  easier  to 
stimulate  necessary  use  of  these  latter  agencies  than  to  get 
equivalent  results  from  more  intensive  cultivation  of  the  soil. 

Schroder's  position  was  that  it  would  be  unreasonable  to 
expect  much  more  public  revenue  from  the  workers  on  the  soil, 
for  they  were  already  as  miserable  as  they  could  be,  without 
being  driven  out  of  the  country  or  out  of  existence.  Without 
taking  up  the  problem  of  improving  the  condition  of  agricul- 
tural populations,  which  was  not  his  division  of  labor,  he 
insisted  that  a  wise  fiscal  policy  would  drop  the  idea  of  further 
exactions  from  this  overburdened  stratum,  and  would  set 
about  developing  more  fruitful  sources  of  supply. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  very  expressions  which  have  been 
distorted  into  evidence  that  Schroder  did  not  regard  the  soil  as 
a  source  of  wealth,  and  did  not  care  how  much  the  rural  folk 
were  oppressed,  are  evidently,  in  the  light  of  the  context,  first, 
acknowledgments  that  agriculture  is  the  first  and  obvious 
resource  of  a  people  and  a  state,  and  second,  protests  against 
exhausting  this  resource. 

It  should  not  be  necessary  for  an  American  democrat  to 
guard  himself  by  repeating  that  he  is  not  an  apologist  for  the 
doctrine  of  divine  right.  It  is  no  longer  necessary  nor  tolerable, 
however,  for  Americans  to  caricature  the  doctrine  as  it  was 
actually  held  by  men  in  the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth  cen- 
turies. In  order  correctly  to  interpret  the  cameralism  of  the 
books,  as  a  distinct  movement  in  the  development  of  a  tech- 
nology of  the  state,  we  must  do  justice  to  Schroder,  especially 
against  endeavors,  prompted  by  a  surviving  civic  formalism, 
to  discredit  his  most  worthy  ideas. 

For  example,  separated  from  their  context,  the  opening 


i62  THE  CAMERALISTS 

sentences  of  chap,  vii,  "How  a  Prince  May  Have  as  Much 
Money  as  He  Will,"  are  among  the  evidences  which  the 
opponents  of  Schroder  quoted  to  prove  that  he  sanctioned 
unlimited  extortion  by  rulers.    He  says: 

In  a  well-ordered  state,  neither  metes  nor  bounds  nor  times  nor 
seasons  prescribe  to  the  prince  how  much  money  he  shall  raise  from 
his  country  nor  how  often.  For  the  course  of  circumstances  is 
uneven,  and  there  is  no  regularity  about  the  gains  of  different 

subjects Hence  a  prince  must  seek  his  interest  with  the 

parties  who  are  gaining,  and  are  thus  in  a  position  to  pay,  and  if  a 
prince  always  gets  a  share  of  the  profits  of  those  who  gain,  he  will 
have  a  daily  source  of  supply,  for  someone  always  gains,  and  no  one 
can  find  fault,  because  only  a  tithe  is  sought  by  the  prince  of  the 
gains  which  arc  made  under  his  protection  (pp.  6i,  62). 

In  this  passage  Schroder  simply  starts  with  the  common 
absolutistic  premises  of  all  theorists  of  his  time,  and  as  we 
have  said  above,  his  cameralistic  critics  discredited  themselves 
by  attempting  to  turn  against  him  the  very  theory  which  they 
themselves  asserted.  More  than  this,  Schroder's  use  of  the 
absolutistic  formula  in  this  connection  evidently  meant  just 
what  an  expounder  of  the  idea  of  eminent  domain  would  mean 
if  he  should  say  today,  for  the  sake  of  emphasis,  "in  the  last 
analysis  there  is  no  limit  to  the  right  of  the  state  to  expropriate 
the  private  owner  of  land,  with  due  compensation,  if  the  needs 
of  the  state  require."  The  latter  expression  in  the  mouth  of  a 
modem  lawyer  would  hardly  be  understood  as  committing 
him  to  a  general  policy  of  expropriation.  In  the  same  way 
Schroder  first  stated  in  its  extremest  form  a  principle  to  which 
all  civic  theorists  of  his  class  assented ;  but  this  statement  was 
merely  to  introduce  the  counterbalancing  consideration  that 
it  would  be  fatal  to  the  prosperity  0/  the  state  to  carry  the  pre- 
rogative to  this  extreme.  The  whole  significance  of  Schroder's 
book  is  in  its  attempt  to  show  how  the  prince  might  get  revenues 
more  successfully  by  promoting  unexploited  sources  of  supply 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SCHRODER  163 

than  by  crushing  the  life  out  of  the  primary  sources  by  extorting 
the  last  fraction  which  they  could  be  made  to  yield. 

It  would  be  disingenuous  not  to  quote  the  most  extreme 
expressions  in  which  Schroder  seems  to  betray  a  quite  different 
spirit.  Perhaps  the  most  difficult  case  is  chap,  cviii,  which 
consists  of  a  single  paragraph.  The  title  of  this  chapter  reads: 
"How  a  Prince  May  Also  Seize  and  Use  the  Capital  of  the 
Country,  and  Still  Not  Ruin  the  Country  Thereby."  The 
following  is  the  entire  discussion  under  that  head: 

Although  I  have  demonstrated  that  a  prince  may  hoard  in  his 
chest  no  more  wealth  than  the  country  has  earned  [erworben],  yet 
I  must  say  something  further,  namely,  how  a  prince  without  ruin  of 
the  country  and  of  business  may  also  go  farther  and  employ  [angrrif- 
fen]  the  capital  of  his  land.  This  takes  place  if  a  prince  causes  ihe 
subjects  to  do  business  with  his  own  capital.  Since  now  this  is  one 
of  the  secrets  of  a  monarchy,  I  wonder  that  princes  do  not  reflect 
more  upon  it,  because  by  this  means  they  could  gradually  obtain  an 
absolute  sovereignty,  and  could  make  the  subjects  virtually  their 
body  slaves,  when  the  latter  in  time  would  see  their  worldly  goods 
in  the  hands  of  the  prince.' 

His  language  in  an  earlier  passage  (p.  66)  may  be  cited  as 
a  fairer  index  of  the  spirit  of  Schroder's  theory  and  policy. 

And  this  in  my  opinion  is  the  inexhaustible  treasure  of  a  prince, 
by  means  of  which  he  may  be  a  benefactor  of  the  poor,  a  refuge  for 
the  oppressed,  a  builder  of  fine  cities,  and  fortifications,  founder  of 

1 1  confess  that  I  am  unable  to  offer  a  plausible  explanation  of  this 
passage,  beyond  the.  observation  that  it  is  too  summary  and  too  detached 
from  the  rest  of  the  author's  argument  to  reveal  his  full  meaning.  On 
the  whole,  I  classify  it  as  a  vagrant  conceit  which  the  author  did  not 
regard  as  within  the  scope  of  practical  politics.  From  the  absolutistic 
point  of  view,  it  was  a  counsel  of  perfection;  a  vision  of  the  absolutistic 
regime  so  realized  that  the  prince  would  be  a  corporation  sole,  both 
politically  and  industrially,  while  the  subjects  would  have  legal  existence 
merely  as  his  agents.  The  passage,  however,  has  the  effect  of  a  mere 
fugitive  suggestion,  without  significance  enough  of  any  sort  to  affect  our 
estimate  of  the  author's  general  purpose. 


i64  THE  CAMERALISTS 

many  churches  and  schools.  This  is  the  treasure  with  which  a 
prince  may  equip  his  capital  city  with  qualified  people,  and  may 
sustain  the  magnificence  of  his  court,  with  all  of  which  the  land  need 
not  be  ruined,  as  the  common  man  thinks,  but  it  will  rather  be  made 
prosperous.  In  all  these  things  a  prince  has  only  to  see  that  the 
money  so  expended  remains  in  the  country.  For  in  this  way  a  prince 
does  only  that  which  is  fitting.  Since  he  sees  that  gains  in  the 
country  are  unevenly  divided,  he  takes  from  him  who  seems  to  have 
gained  from  others  more  than  his  social  position  or  his  merit  justifies, 
and  gives  it  to  another.  In  order,  however,  that  the  latter  may  not 
enjoy  his  gains  in  idleness,  he  must  in  return  do  something  which 
will  either  contribute  to  the  upbuilding  of  the  land  or  to  the  pleasure 
and  magnificence  of  the  prince.  Thus  I  can  with  complete  right 
call  a  prince  a  great  national  Lord  of  Exchange,  or  as  Aristotle 

expresses  it,  Cuslodis  et  Dispensatoris  communium  bonorum 

Accordingly  a  prince  may  use  the  whole  capiial  of  the  country,  and 
as  much  more  as  the  whole  capital  is  worth  (sic),  if  he  only  soon 
consumes  it  and  causes  it  to  course  among  the  people;  for  a  prince 
is  the  stomach  of  the  country,  the  assessments  are  the  foods  which  it 
digests.  If  the  foods  are  not  digested  in  the  stomach,  and  the 
strength  divided  among  the  parts  of  the  body,  the  members  will  lose 
strength  and  die,  but  the  stomach  will  die  with  them. 

Since  we  have  said,  however,  that  the  prince  should  take  where 
there  is  ability  to  give,  and  where  it  can  be  spared,  it  follows  that  a 
prince  must  know  the  means  of  each  person  in  the  country,  together 
with  his  manner  of  support  and  his  earnings,  in  order  that  he  may 
perceive  how  the  money  in  the  land  is  divided,  and  in  what  direction 
it  tends.  This,  however,  appears  to  be  an  impossible  affair,  and 
there  is  no  practicable  proposition  to  make  it  possible. 

It  is  not  necessary  to  notice  all  the  naive  economic  con- 
ceptions which  this  language  implies.  Our  attention  may  be 
confined  to  the  main  line  of  argument.  The  strategic  point  in 
Schroder's  calculation  is  indicated  by  the  title  of  chap,  viii, 
"Whether  a  Prince  Can  Know  How  Much  Each  Citizen 
Earns  or  Might  Earn,  in  Order  That  He  May  Know  How 
the  Money  Is  Distributed."     Schroder  does  not  profess  to  have 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SCHRODER  165 

discovered  a  perfect  method  of  answering  the  question,  but 
he  thinks  an  approach  may  be  made  to  it  that  would  go  far  to 
remove  the  existing  chaos,  and  increase  fairness  in  demands 
for  payments  to  the  princely  treasury.  He  begins  by  dividing 
the  population  into  nine  sorts,  each  to  be  treated  in  accordance 
with  their  relative  abilities:  (i)  clergy;  (2)  nobility;  (3) 
peasants;  (4)  artisans;  (5)  merchants;  (6)  court  or  state 
functionaries;   (7)  lenders;^    (8)  usurers;'   (9)  players.3 

The  last  section  of  the  chapter  presents  a  puzzle  by  naming 
four  ways  which  each  of  these  classes  have  of  gaining  money, 
viz.:  (a)  finding  treasure,  whether  in  natural  deposits,  or 
hidden  or  lost  goods;  (b)  conversion  of  the  unripe  or  imperfect 
metals  {sic)  into  good  gold  or  silver;  (c)  inheritance;  (d) 
presents.  This  schedule  does  not  seem  to  correspond  with 
the  subsequent  analysis  of  the  gainful  occupations  of  the  nine 
classes.  The  clue  to  the  discrepancy  is,  first,  that  the  section 
is  not,  as  might  appear  at  first  reading,  a  r^sum^  of  the  ordinary 
sources  from  which  these  classes  get  their  incomes.  It  is  an 
enumeration  of  extraordinary  sources  common  to  all  of  them. 
The  precise  language  is:  "All  these  have  still"  (e.  g.,  in  addi- 
tion to  the  resources  peculiar  to  each)  "four  means  of  getting 
money,  or  of  becoming  rich,  which  appertain  to  one  as  well 
as  to  the  others,  viz.,"  etc. 

The  more  one  reflects  upon  the  use  of  language  in  such 
passages  as  this,  the  more  clear  it  becomes  that  tradition  has 
forced  into  it  associations  which  the  words  did  not  carry  in  the 
minds  of  the  cameralistic  authors.  As  we  have  said  above, 
it  is  an  unpardonable  anachronism  to  make  these  authors 
discourse  upon  the  antecedent  problems  of  wealth  in  the 
abstract,  when  they  were  discussing  merely  the  most  available 

1 1,  e.,  not  of  money  but  of  other  useful  articles. 

*  Not  necessarily  in  the  invidious  sense. 

3  Including  not  merely  gamblers  but  purveyors  of  amusement,  etc. 


l66  THE  CAMERALISTS 

mcth(Kl  of  accumulating  ready  means  for  the  individual  or  for 
the  state. 

Schroder  goes  on  immediately  to  cite  the  schedules  in  use 
in  the  duchy  of  Gotha,  for  the  twenty  years  previous  to  his 
writing,  for  classifying  the  extractive  industries  v^rithin  the 
state,  and  for  purposes  of  assessment.'  It  is  not  our  affair  to 
])ass  on  the  skill  or  the  wisdom  displayed  in  Schroder's  attempt 
to  outline  a  more  complete  industrial  census  either  for  rural 
or  urban  taxation.  The  essential  point  is  that  what  he  did 
in  a  relatively  crude  way  became  a  matter  of  course  v^th  later 
cameralists;  and  a  large  part  of  their  work  was  devoted  cither 
to  explanation  of  the  routine  methods  of  assessment  upon  this 
basis,  or  to  elaboration  of  other  schemes  along  lines  partly 
drawn  liy  Schroder.  It  is  impossible  to  decide  from  the  sub- 
sequent literature  to  what  extent  use  was  made  in  practice  of 
Schrikler's  calculus  of  the  relative  value  to  the  nation  of  different 
branches  of  manufacture  (chaps,  xv-xviii).  At  the  least,  it 
was  a  serious  attempt  to  understand  a  division  of  industry 
which  was  rapidly  assuming  firstrate  importance  in  the  reckon- 
ing of  all  German  states. 

Schroder's  conception  of  the  functions  of  Policey  are  by 

•    means  as  farsighted  as  his  fiscal  perceptions.    They  do 

hkX  even  seem  to  be  as  comprehensive  as  Osse's.     They  did 

ii.)t  go  beyond  emphasis  of  the  need  of  governmental  inter- 

'  These  sthcdulfs  are  rcfluced  to  a  conspectus  which  is  numbered 
as  chap,  xii,  and  af)[)cars  as  an  insert  in  the  edition  of  1744.  The  insert 
has  been  removed  from  the  copy  of  the  original  edition  which  I  have 
used.  The  tabic  is  a  complete  answer  to  the  irresponsible  charge  that 
Schroder  ignored  the  extractive  industries  as  a  source  of  wealth.  It 
should  have  estopped  Se(  kcndorfT's  denunciation  {vide  above,  p.  135). 
If  Se(  kendorfT's  master,  Krnst  the  Pious,  was  not  an  extortioner  and  a 
villain  in  using  this  schedule  for  fiscal  purjKjses,  surely  Schroder  cannot 
}>c  condemned  for  making  it  his  fK)inl  of  departure  in  attempting  to 
outline  a  more  e(|uitable  system.  Thomasius  recorded  a  fairly  judicial 
estimate  of  Schroder,  in  the  Teslamenl,  p.  152,  n.  76. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SCHRODER  167 

ferencc  to  prevent  neglect  of  duties  by  servants  of  all  classes. 
The  phrase,  however,  which  Schroder  applies  to  Policey  in 
chap,  xxviii,  viz.,  "(ft«  Grundjeste  upon  which  all  that  has 
previously  been  said  must  rest,"  quite  likely  furnished  the 
suggestion  which  gave  Justi  the  title  for  his  most  elaborate 
cameralistic  volume,  on  Policeywissenschaft.^ 

If  we  reach  a  clear  understanding  that  Schroder,  and  all 
the  rest  of  the  cameralists,  when  treating  of  their  central  fiscal 
problem,  did  not  raise  the  later  question  of  pure  economics, 
but  were  dealing  primarily  with  problems  of  immediate  appli- 
cation of  fiscal  means  to  fiscal  ends,  and  secondarily  with 
problems  of  adjustment  of  the  people's  activities  to  the  need 
of  improved  standards  of  life,  whether  principally  in  their  own 
interest  or  that  of  the  treasury,  this  perception  at  once  shows 
that  as  pure  economists  or  sociologists  we  have  no  immediate 
concern  with  their  conclusions  about  technological  details. 
Our  interest  is  primarily  in  the  part  which  they  played  in 
developing  a  general  philosophy  of  society,  and  the  particulars 
are  of  value  to  us  only  as  indexes  of  their  relation  to  larger 
conceptions.  Enough  has  been  said,  therefore,  to  establish 
the  position  of  Schroder  in  the  cameralistic  series.  His  main 
object  was  to  increase  the  ready  means  of  the  prince,  while 
incidentally  lightening  the  burdens  of  the  people.  The  general 
scope  of  his  conclusions  may  be  gathered  by  reference  to  his 
table  of  contents,  especially  to  the  titles  of  chaps,  xxx-cv. 

Our  analysis  of  Schroder  may  be  completed  by  a  reflection 
which  has  also  some  measure  of  relevance  to  all  the  cameralists. 
We  must  distinctly  note  that  the  cameralistic  estimate  of 
proportions  between  gold  and  silver  and  other  goods,  which 
we  have  discussed,  is  less  a  vagary  about  economic  principles 
than  an  appraisal  of  civic  values  corresponding  with  con- 
temporary judgments  of  relative  civic  needs.  If  Schroder  had 
been  plied  with  Socratic  questions  about  wealth,  in  Adam 
I  Vide  below,  p.  452. 


i68  THE  CAMERALISTS 

Smith's  sense,  after  getting  the  concept  defined,  he  would  have 
been  obliged  to  retract  nothing  in  principle  which  he  had 
intended  to  assert  before  that  more  generalized  term  had  been 
brought  to  his  attention.  Maintaining  his  position,  he  might 
have  restated  his  views  in  this  way:  "I  quite  agree  that  we 
may  give  a  common  name  to  all  the  material  things  which  men 
want  to  use,  and  which  they  may  exchange.  If  we  call  these 
wealth,  the  agricultural  products  which  feed  people,  the  manu- 
factured forms  of  those  products  which  clothe  people,  and  the 
other  manufactured  forms  which  satisfy  people's  demands  for 
convenience  and  comfort,  are  of  course  wealth,  just  as  much 
as  the  gold  and  silver  which  enable  the  prince  to  maintain  the 
government,  and  the  people  to  make  their  exchanges.  My 
contention  is,  however,  that  the  need  of  making  the  govern- 
ment strong  is  so  pre-eminent  that  the  wealth  which  satisfies  this 
need  is  beyond  all  comparison  the  most  important  wealth,  and 
must  \)e  provided  for  whether  there  is  increase  of  other  wealth 
or  not." 

Here  would  be  a  plain  contrast  between  the  cameralistic 
and  the  modem  scale  of  social  values.  It  would  assign  to 
money  a  higher  ratio  of  value  in  the  state  than  it  has  in  modem 
theory.  The  reason  would  be  not  that  cameralism  essentially 
varied  from  modem  theory  on  the  economic  principles  of 
wealth,  but  rather  that  cameralism  varied  from  modem  theory 
on  antecedent  political  philosophy.  It  posited  an  order  of 
precedence  between  governmental  strength  and  popular 
prosperity  which  democratic  theory  has  inverted.  That  is, 
the  cameralistic  theory  was  that  popular  prosperity  dep>ends 
on  strong  govemment.  Modem  theory,  at  least  in  its  demo- 
cratic forms,  holds  that  strong  govemment  depends  upon 
popular  prosperity.  Thus  the  cameralistic  theory,  which 
systematized  mercantilistic  practice,  did  not  so  much  assert 
fundamentally  incorrect  economic  principles  as  it  transferred 
emphasis  from  more  to  less  ultimate  principles,  for  the  sake 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SCHRODER  169 

of  supposed  immediate  political  expediency.  The  needed 
correction  of  cameralism  v^as  less  new  knowledge  of  the  sources 
of  material  goods  than  new  valuations  of  the  scale  of  ends  to 
which  material  goods  should  be  applied.  Along  with  the 
absolutistic  major  premise,  "The  fiscal  needs  of  the  prince  are 
the  paramount  needs  in  the  state,"  went  the  minor  premise, 
"There  is  more  to  be  gained  for  the  princely  fiscus  by  exploit- 
ing other  means  of  revenue  than  by  depending  upon  further 
exploitation  of  the  primary  natural  resources."  Thif  was 
not  a  false  economic  principle,  but  a  specific  judgment  about 
the  relative  availability  of  an  economic  principle  in  a  particular 
situation.  The  subsequent  development  of  cameralism  shows 
a  marked  increase  of  relative  emphasis  upon  the  value  of  the 
extractive  industries.  This  change  does  not  reflect  a  revolu- 
tion in  fundamental  economic  conceptions.  It  denotes  on  the 
one  hand  increased  attention  to  the  technique  of  agricultural 
management,  with  correspondingly  enlarged  ideas  of  the 
maximum  resources  of  nature;  and  on  the  other  hand,  expan- 
sion of  cameralistic  science  so  that  its  fiscal  division  was  better 
balanced  by  variously  classified  divisions  which  brought  some 
of  the  neglected  elements  of  the  civic  situation  under  equally 
systematic  analysis. 

Of  Schroder  as  a  promoter  of  the  practical  economic  policy 
of  Austria  it  does  not  fall  within  the  scope  of  this  book  to  speak. 
Whether  his  judgment  was  the  wisest  under  the  circumstances, 
and  whether  the  commercial  expedients  which  he  advocated 
were  in  the  line  of  general  technological  prudence,  are  questions 
which  would  be  appropriate  in  a  more  special  study  than  our 
programme  proposes.  The  foregoing  analysis  sufficiently 
covers  the  most  essential  question  about  him.  Objective 
study  permits  us  to  accept  the  judgment  neither  of  certain 
interested  contemporaries,  who  would  have  had  Schroder 
regarded  as  a  prophet  of  evil,  nor  of  the  schematic  appraisers 
of  mercantilism  in  general,  who  represent  all  its  theorists  as 


lyo  THE  CAMERALISTS 

teaching  grotesque  doctrines.  These  vagaries  appear  to  have 
been  imputed  to  them  first  by  opponents  of  the  mercantiiistic 
programme,  and  to  have  come  down  to  us  in  place  of  the 
authentic  opinions  of  a  group  of  thinkers  whose  economic 
conceptions  turn  out  to  have  been  much  more  valid  than  their 
views  of  political  philosophy. 

In  this  connection  a  few  words  must  be  said  about  four 
writers  who,  by  general  consent  of  the  historians,  rank  as 
satellites  of  the  principal  group  discussed  in  this  and  the 
f)rcceding  chapter.  We  name  first  the  otherwise  apparently 
unknown  writer,  von  Klenck.^  His  book  may  be  called  a 
shorter  catechism  of  mercantilism.  It  contains  262  pages  of 
large  p(x:ket-diary  shape.  It  can  be  inserted  in  the  vest  pocket, 
and  if  printed  on  thin  paper,  with  flexible  covers,  would  be 
conveniently  portable.     Roscher  says: 

A  lxx)k  in  many  respects  enigmatical  is  the  FiirsUiche  Macht- 
kunst  ....  which  I  have  been  able  to  obtain  only  in  the  ninth 
edition,  Frankfurth  and  Leipzig,  1740,  under  the  title:  Tractal 
von  Manujacluren  und  Commercio.  It  is  said  to  have  been  published 
in  1702  at  Halle,  or  in  1703  at  Weissenfels,  by  the  well-known 
Hcinrich  Bode,  professor  of  law  at  Halle.  The  author,  a  certain 
Herr  von  Klenck,  is  said  to  have  suppressed  it,  after  it  had  been 
severely  attacked  in  1704,  in  the  monograph,  Das  Gold  des  publiquen 
credits,  welches  der  vornehme  Aulor  der  jursUichen  Machtkunst  und 
uncrschopflichen  Goldgruben  durch  Ilerrn  G.  B.'s  Gutigkeii  und 
Vermillelung  bcschauen  lasscn,  auj  dem  Probierstein  der  gesunden 
Vernunjl  zum  Commercio  untauglich  bejunden  von  einem  Lubecker 
Kaujmann  (p.  303).' 

«  FursUiche  Macht-Kunst,  Oder  Unerschopfliche  Gold-Grube, 
Wordurch  ein  Furst  sick  kan  miichlig  und  seine  Unierlhanen  retch  machen. 
Durch  cinen  in  vielen  Wisscn«5challten  Erfahrnen  Vornehmen  Cavallier 
entworfTen,  und  mit  dcssen  Guthefindcn  heraus  gegeben  Von  Heinrich 
lioilen,  Konigl.  Preussis.  Rath  im  Hcrtzoglhum  Magdeb.  und  Prof. 
Jur.  in  Halle,  Kditio  III.  The  editor's  preface  is  dated  Halle,  July  3, 
1703. 

»  The  ihirfl  edition,  which  I  have  used,  is  not  dated.  It  appears  to 
be  identical  with  the  original. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SCHRODER  171 

Roscher  also  quotes  the  statement  (p.  303,  note),  that 
Klenck's  book  was  republished  in  1773  as  an  appendix  to  the 
volume  Klugheit  zu  leben  und  zu  herrschen. 

Although  Roscher  finds  in  Klenck  some  slight  variations 
from  Schroder,  and  even  improvements  upon  his  teachings 
(pp.  303,  304),  they  are  not  important  enough  to  require  our 
attention.  In  his  Preface  the  author  expressly  states  that  he 
wrote  the  book  in  the  hope  that  it  would  be  more  successful 
in  attracting  the  notice  of  young  princes  than  the  more  pre- 
tentious writings  on  the  subject.  He  apparently  had  sf)me 
particular  prince  in  mind.  At  the  same  time  he  expressly 
disclaims  the  purpose  of  being  original,  and  declares  that  he 
has  drawn  his  conclusions  from  the  best  authorities.  The 
book  emphasizes  and  popularizes  the  best  in  the  previous 
mercantilists.  It  is  especially  clear  and  strong  in  its  assertions 
that  the  strength  and  riches  of  the  prince  must  l)e  based  upon 
the  strength  and  riches  of  the  people,  and  that  the  ancient 
prejudice  against  industrial  and  commercial  pursuits  as 
unworthy  of  the  nobility  must  give  place  to  pride  in  those 
occupations. 

Whether  the  author's  hope  of  appealing  to  young  princes 
was  realized  does  not  appear.  References  to  his  book  by 
later  and  influential  writers  show  that  he  actually  did  have  a 
share  in  winning  respect  for  the  views  which  he  represented.' 
We  need  note  simply  that  Klenck  leaves  no  room  for  doubt 
that  he  is  a  typical  cameralist,  as  described  in  our  general 
formula.'    He  begins  his  Vorrede  with  the  observation: 

All  the  world  knows  that  in  a  few  centuries  France,  England, 
and  Holland,  not  so  much  through  force  of  arms,  as  through  a  special 
princely  art  and  science,  have  advanced  to  such  a  high  power,  that 
the  gold  and  silver  streams  of  the  whole  world  seem  to  run  into  them, 

«  For  example,  vide  Thomasius  on  Klenck,  Testament,  pp.  99  flF., 
n.  41. 

»  Vide  above,  p.  6. 


172  THE  CAMERALISTS 

as  to  an  exhaustless  sea.  To  reflect  upon  such  princely  power,  and 
with  it  to  serve  the  Fatherland,  is  demanded  of  every  true  patriot. 
I  accordingly  devote  this  study  to  the  art  of  princely  power,  and  I 
feel  at  liberty  to  call  it  a  Studium  Magnificum  quod  Magnos  facit, 
whereby  in  our  beloved  Fatherland  hidden  springs  of  gold  may  be 
opened.  I  accordingly  call  this  Machtkunst  a  science  highly  neces- 
sary for  princes,  of  so  directing  all  gainful  occupations  that,  ex 
Bono  Publico  of  the  land,  the  princely  treasury  may  be  enriched, 
and  the  prince  may  become  powerful.  The  "finis  Primarius  is 
thus  the  Bonum  Publicum,  the  riches  and  prosperity  of  the  land, 
quo  Reipublicae  bene  fit;  whence  flows  the  Finis  Secundus  or  Secun- 
darius,  the  power  and  great  might  of  the  ruling  prince,  as  from  the 
proper  source  and  spring.  If  the  same  contains  much  water,  the 
prince  can  also  have  much.  Hence  the  welfare  of  the  prince  is  so 
closely  bound  up  with  that  of  his  subjects  that  the  one  without  the 
other  cannot  come  into  being,  and  still  less  be  permanent. 

The  second  of  these  lesser  writers  is  Paul  Jacob  Marperger, 
1 656-1 730.  He  made  an  impression  by  his  much  writing,  but 
he  was  the  author  of  nothing  of  even  second-rate  importance." 

The  third  in  this  minor  group,  "much  less  known  by  his 
contemporaries,  but  intellectually  much  the  superior  of  Mar- 
f)erger,  was  Johann  Georg  Leib."' 

While  it  is  not  certain  that  Leib  added  an)rthing  to  the 
theory  of  his  predecessors,  writers  of  his  class  are  important 
for  our  purpose.  They  furnish  cumulative  evidence  of  the 
spirit  of  the  doctrine  which  they  tried  to  expound.  The 
Varrede  to  Leib's  book  begins  in  this  way: 

There  are  many  who  have  such  a  bad  opinion  of  the  Sludium 
Cameralis  or  Oeconomiae  Principis  that  they  think  it  impossible  to 

'  Roscher  seldom  packs  as  much  into  a  few  words  as  in  his  estimate: 
"In  der  Hauptsache  ist  Marperger  als  ein  Verwasserer  des  von  ihm 
bewunderten  Becher  zu  charakterisiren.  Ein  entsetzlicher  Vielschreiber, 
der  z.  B.  in  seinem  Ersten  Hundert  gelehrter  Kaufleute  (1717)  35  Biicher 
aufzahlt,  die  er  seit  i6y8  herausgegeben,  und  noch  71  andere,  zum 
Dnick  bereite  Schriften."     {Vide  Roscher,  p.  301.) 

»  Von  Verbesserung  Land  und  Leuten,  und  wie  ein  Regent  seint 
Macht  und  Ansehen  erheben  konne  (1708). 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SCHRODER  173 

raise  the  revenues  of  a  great  lord  without  adding  to  the  tears  and 
sighs  of  their  subjects.  How  mistaken  this  idea  is  may  easily  be 
shown  by  the  fact  that  the  chief  and  only  purpose  of  this  study  is 
to  put  the  whole  body  of  subjects  in  a  permanent  condition  of  well- 
being,  and  only  from  their  surplus,  and  in  a  just  manner,  to  increase 
the  income  of  the  lord  of  the  land,  and  to  raise  his  power  and  repute; 
....  I  cannot  deny  that  abuses  which  have  entered  into  fiscal 
administration  as  a  common  evil  have  been  my  sole  reason  for  this 
writing,  out  of  love  for  the  common  good.  Accordingly,  I  have 
attempted  to  show  how  the  welfare  of  the  land,  or  the  well-being  of 
the  subjects,  is  inseparably  bound  up  with  the  interest  of  the  ruler, 
and  this  is  the  true  and  sole  principle  of  the  whole  cameralistic  study. 
Moreover,  my  chief  rule  for  increasing  the  power  of  the  land  is  to 
retain  money  in  the  country,  and  to  bring  it  from  other  countries. 
If  this  rule  is  observed,  it  follows  without  dispute  that  the  welfare 
of  the  land  will  be  thereby  promoted,  and  the  subjects  will  be  made 
richer.  And  if  the  subjects  are  made  richer,  then  they  can  without 
harm  and  embarrassment  pay  to  the  lord  of  the  land,  for  the  pro- 
tection which  is  so  profitable,  an  increased  tribute.  Then  the 
ampler  treasure  of  the  prince  must  put  him  in  power  and  repute 
with  other  rulers. 

The  whole  book  is  an  amplification  of  these  propositions. 
Whatever  may  have  been  the  morale  of  the  typical  German 
government  in  this  period,  these  theorists  represent  the  stand- 
ards which  the  governments  were  supposed  to  respect. 

Finally,  we  must  select  from  others  who  might  be  named 
in  this  connection  Theodor  Ludwig  Lau.^ 

If  Lau  was  not  personally  a  grievous  ass,  he  went  far  out 

of  his  way  to  misrepresent  himself,  not  only  in  his  dedication, 

but  in  his  garrulous  and  "kittenish"  Vorrede.    The  one  detail 

'  Roscher  refers  to  him  (p.  379)  as  "  Der  kurldndische  Hofrath  und 
Cahinetsdirector."  His-  book  is  entitled  Aufrichtiger  Vorschlag:  von 
GlUcklicher:  vortheilhaff tiger:  bestdndiger  Einrichtung  der  Intraden: 
und  Einkunfften;  der  Souverainen:  und  ihrer  Unterlhanen;  In  welchen: 
Von  Policey-  und  Cammer-Negocien  und  Steuer  Sachen:  gehandelt  ivird. 
Entworffen  Von  dem  HochfUrstlich-Curlandischem  Hoff-Rath,  und 
Cabinets-Djrecteur,  Theodor  Ludwig  Lau  ....  17 19. 


174  THE  CAMERALISTS 

which  is  worthy  of  record  about  his  book  is  that  it  made  more 
than  any  previous  text  of  the  classification  of  cameralistic 
science  into  the  divisions  which  were  in  general  accepted  to 
the  end  of  the  cameralistic  period.  That  is,  the  Aufrichtiger 
Vorschlag  was  divided  into  four  books,  treating  respectively 
of  (i)  Policey;  (2)  finance  {Entwurff  einer  ivoldeingerichUten 
Cammer);  (3)  commerce  {Entwurff  wohlregulirter  Negocien), 
in  which  the  first  part  is  entitled  "Von  den  Manufacturen" 
and  the  second,  "Von  den  Commercien;"  (4)  taxation  {Entwurff 
Wohleingerichteter  Steuren).  This  main  part  of  the  volume 
occupies  324  pages.  There  follows  a  monograph  of  130  pages 
treating  in  detail  certain  practical  phases  of  the  subject  of  the 
fourth  part  of  the  text.  The  title-page  of  this  tract  is  notable 
for  its  reiteration  of  the  idea  of  community  of  interest  between 
subjects  and  rulers.^ 

A  still  more  complete  account  of  cameralistic  literature 
at  this  period  would  include  such  writers  as  Gleichmann,' 
Gundling,3  and  a  little  later  Schreber,^  and  J.  A.  Hoffmann. s 

«  Practixche  VorscM&ge,  Welcher  gestalt  Steuer  und  respective  Con- 
tribution zum  Nutun  Eines  Landes-Herren,  und  ohne  Nachtheil  der 
Unlerthanen  einzurichten  seye,  Damit  unter  alien  steuerbaren  und  Con- 
tribuablen  Dingen  eine  proportionirte  Gleichheit,  Nach  Anleitung  der 
Reichs-Ahschiede,  gehalten,  und  kein  Unterthan  vor  dem  andern  graviret 
werde,  A  uch,  wie  alle  Unter schleiffe  und  viele  Kosten  vermieden,  Und  der 
Steuer-  und  respective  Contributions-Stock  in  bestdndiger  Richtigkeit 
erhalten  werden  kan,  Ausfiihrlich  projectirt  und  turn  Druck  befordert. 
Im  Jahr  1721. 

»  Kurtzer  Begrijf  von  einer  unbetrdglichen  FUrstlichen  Machtkunst 
(17 11);  vide  Roscher,  p.  377. 

3  Einleitung  zur  wahren  Staatsklugheit  (posth.,  1751);  vide  Roscher, 
loc.  cit. 

4  "Der  I^-ipziger  Profcsssor  der  Oekonomie,  Polizei  und  Cameral- 
wlsscnschaft."  Hauptwerk:  Abhandlung  von  Cammergiitern  und 
Einkunften,  deren  Verpachtung  und  Administration  (1743);  vide 
Roscher,  loc.  cit. 

s  Politische  A  nmerkungen  iiber  die  wahre  und  falsche  Staatskunst, 
worin  aus  den  Geschichten  alter  Zeit  bemerket  wird,  was  einem  Lande 
tutraglich  oder  schddlich  sei  (Latin,  17 18;  German,  1725);  vide  Roscher, 
p.  380- 


CHAPTER  VII 
THE  CAMERALISTICS  OF  GERHARD 

Gerhard  is  of  value  in  the  first  instance  as  a  witness  to  the 
influence  of  SeckendorfiF.  His  book  is  a  mere  tract  of  seventy 
pages.^  It  is  notable  for  mobilizing  the  term  Staatswissen- 
schaft  as  a  synonym  of  the  term  Staats-I^hre  used  in  the  title; 
and  this  fact  evidently  corresponds  with  an  enlargement  of 
vision  which  was  widening  the  outlook  of  German  political 
theorists,  and  at  the  same  time  giving  their  views  a  more  coherent 
content.  The  author  declares  that  his  intention  in  writing 
the  book  is  to  introduce  beginners  to  the  subject,  not  to  address 
the  learned.  He  also  frankly  states  that  he  wants  the  book, 
and  the  lectures  based  on  it,  to  lead  up  to  the  study  of  Secken- 
dorflf's  Teutscher  Fiirsten  Stoat.  With  the  book  and  the 
lectures  on  it  as  a  preparation  for  his  course  on  Seckendorff, 
he  hopes  to  give  his  students  an  adequate  idea  of  "the  whole 
sludium  politicum  in  general."  Gerhard  was  aj)parently  a 
member  of  the  law  faculty  at  Jena  in  1713,  and  was  among  the 
academic  men  who  were  smuggling  the  beginnings  of  camera- 
listics  into  the  universities  before  special  profess()rshi[)s  of  that 
subject  were  founded. 

Gerhard's  book  consists  of  six  chapters,  with  an  a[)pcndix 
on  Seckendorff's  political  writings.  If  it  were  to  be  judged 
by  its  size,  it  would  be  set  down  as  a  negligible  factor  in  the 
inteq)retation  of  cameralism.  There  is  strong  internal  evidence, 
however,  that  the  author  deserves  more  attention  than  he  has 
received.  Roscher,  for  example,  devotes  to  him  less  than  a 
whole  sentence.'  He  was  not  a  mere  echo  of  Seckcndorfl. 
In  the  first  place,  as  a  lecturer  at  Jena,  he  evidently  did  more 

'  D.  Ephraim  Gerhards  "  Einleitung  zur  Staats-Lehre,"  Nehst  ange- 
hengten  Discurs  von  des  Herrn  von  Seckendorf  Politischen  Schrijten. 
....  1713- 

»  Op.  cit.,  p.  238. 


176  THE  CAMERALISTS 

to  prepare  the  way  for  admission  of  civics,  as  Justi  understood 
that  concept,  to  good  standing  in  the  universities  than  that 
writer  imagined.'  In  the  second  place,  he  was  a  most  instruct- 
ive sign  of  the  times  with  reference  to  currents  of  thought 
about  the  whole  range  of  subjects  which  we  now  refer  to  as 
"the  social  science$."  His  prolegomena  show  that  his  general 
conceptions  of  scientific  relationships  were  far  nearer  those 
which  we  hold  today  than  were  those  which  found  expression 
in  some  of  the  more  pretentious  books.  Quite  likely  this 
accounts  for  his  inconspicuous  place  as  an  author.  Apparently 
he  was  a  man  whose  insight  and  outlook  surveyed  wider 
reaches  of  knowledge  than  he  had  the  constructive  power  to 
control.  He  seems  to  have  had  the  talents  of  a  scout  rather 
than  of  a  commissary-general.  He  detected  strategic  points, 
but  was  not  qualified  to  conduct  campaigns.  Dropping  the 
figure,  it  seems  likely  that  Gerhard  lacked  the  force  or  the 
equipment  necessary  for  writing  books  which  would  have 
accredited  his  methodological  perceptions.  It  would  have 
required  altogether  exceptional  genius  and  learning  to  com- 
pose at  that  time  treatises  which  would  have  filled  out  his 
classification  of  knowledge.  He  has  consequently  left  on  record 
merely  evidence  of  a  certain  precocity  which  must  have  affected 
his  students  as  a  liberalizing  influence,  but  he  lacked  the 
energy  to  make  much  impression  upon  the  slowly  developing 
social  ideas  of  the  p>eriod. 

Not  because  Gerhard's  direct  influence  can  be  traced  in 
the  later  literature  of  the  social  sciences,  but  because  he  gives 
expression  to  ideas  which  were  gathering  force  among  the 
formative  influences  of  his  time,  we  must  give  him  attention 
out  of  proportion  to  the  angle  which  his  book  subtends  in  the 
literature  of  cameralism.' 

«  Vide  below,  p.  296. 

»  In  his  preface  to  Stisser's  Einleitung,  Zincke  throws  light  on  Ger- 
hard's influence  by  the  remark  that  Stisser  "sich  nebst  denen  beriihmten 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  GERHARD  177 

The  first  chapter  deals  primarily  with  very  elementary 
matters  of  terminology.  The  discussion  turns  upon  the  ques- 
tion, What  is  properly  to  be  understood  by  the  name  "Poli- 
ticus"  ?  The  value  of  the  chapter  for  us  is  in  the  light  it  throws 
upon  the  state  of  mind  at  that  time,  both  in  the  general  public 
and  among  academic  people,  about  subjects  which  have  since 
developed  into  the  social  sciences.  The  first  misunderstanding 
to  which  Gerhard  addresses  himself  is  that  there  is  nothing 
in  conmion  between  scholars  and  Politici,  and  that  there  is  no 
room  in  universities  for  subjects  in  which  Politici  would  be 
interested.  This  error,  he  declares,  is  a  part  of  the  confusion 
which  has  come  in  with  the  practice  of  using  the  words  Politicus 
and  Staatsmann  as  S3monyms.  People  at  court  declare  that 
politics  can  be  understood  by  courtiers  alone;  the  universities 
should  therefore  at  most  explain  languages  and  the  Institu- 
tianes  iuris. 

Gerhard's  reply  is  substantially  the  familiar  academic 
exposition  of  the  utility  of  general  training  in  theory  as  a 
preparation  for  acquirement  of  technical  knowledge  and  skill. 
Attempting  to  show  in  particular  what  sort  of  knowledge  may 
be  acquired  in  universities  as  a  preparation  for  practical 
politics,  Gerhard  distinguishes  first  between  "the  rules  of 
righteousness  and  love,  and  the  rules  of  prudence."  The 
latter  are  usually  regarded  as  the  domain  of  politics,  the  former, 
of  natural  and  moral  philosophy.  Gerhard  urges  that  this 
division  of  labor  is  not  wholly  wise,  because  moral  philosophy 
must  be  the  foundation  of  civic  prudence  {Slaats-Klugheit). 
He  says  further: 

If  I  may  speak  to  suit  myself,  I  may  be  allowed  to  distinguish 
between  civic  science  [Staats-Celahrtheii]  and  civic  prudence  [Staais- 

M3,nnem,  Herrmanns,  Stoliens,  Dithmars,  Struvens,  Kressens,  Wild- 
VDgels  und  Schroders,  sonderlich  des  Unterrichts-Hausses  und  Tisches 
des  Herrn  D.  Gerhards  ....  bediente,  unter  dessen  Vorsiz  er  auch, 
17 1 1,  eine  Dissert,  de  crimine  Lenocinii  schrieb  und  vertheidigte." 


1 78  THE  CAMERALISTS 

Klugheit],  while  at  the  same  time  I  want  to  do  justice  to  each.  Civic 
science  is  the  afifair  of  scholars,  and  shows  the  fundamental  principles 
upon  which  a  proper  civic  prudence  rests  its  observations.  Civic 
prudence,  however,  consists  in  skilful  application  of  those  rules  which 
are  prescribed  by  civic  science.  Civic  prudence  must  be  learned  by 
grasp  of  affairs,  civic  science  by  appropriate  reasoning.  The  latter 
is  as  little  the  monopoly  of  the  court  as  the  former  of  the  university, 
although  the  one  is  more  prominent  at  courts  and  the  other  at 
universities  (p.  9). 

Gerhard  goes  on  to  say  that  he  is  not  much  concerned  about 
mere  matters  of  words,  such  as  Staats-Wissenschaft,  Siaats- 
Klugheit,  Staats-Kiinsl,  and  Slaats-Lehre.  The  main  thing 
for  him  is  "that  an  upright  teacher  should  not  confuse  distinct 
disciplines,  and  that  a  right-minded  statesman  must  not 
despise  learning,  while  he  exercises  a  high  degree  of  prudence 
in  his  daily  duties." 

Advancing  in  the  second  chapter  to  more  precise  description 
of  civic  science,  Gerhard  proposes  at  the  outset  the  most  com- 
pact formula  of  civic  science  as  he  views  it,  viz. : 

"A  theory  which  presents  in  proper  order  of  dependence  the 
rules  of  prudence,  through  which  the  community  [gemeines  Wesen\ 
is  kept  in  a  good  state  of  welfare,  and  which  have  as  their  whole  aim 
the  maintenance  of  the  public  state."  In  expanding  this  definition 
Gerhard  urges  that  "civic  science  is  thus  obviously  a  constituent 
part  of  true  science  [Gelahriheit]  in  general,  since  genuine  science  is 
nothing  else  than  a  theory  through  which  human  thoughts  are  set 
toward  the  attainment  and  retention  of  permanent  happiness,  and 
moreover  it  places  definitely  before  the  eyes  of  each  this  appropriate 
purpose."  The  courage  of  the  author's  convictions  speaks  further 
In  the  assertion:  "I  conclude  still  more  that  no  one  has  a  right  to 
claim  the  name  scholar  who  has  not  laid  a  reasonable  basis  of 
scholarship  in  this  very  useful  division  of  learning." 

In  further  analysis  of  science  Gerhard  proceeds: 

The  happiness  of  men  is  to  be  sought  either  in  this  or  in  a  future 
life  of  which  God's  revelation  gives  us  knowledge,  and  of  which 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  GERHARD  179 

reason  itself  gives  us  hope.  In  a  word,  it  is  either  temporal  or 
eternal.  To  the  latter  we  are  led  by  die  hochweise  Erkenntniss  der 
Wahrheit  zur  GoUseligkeit,  oder  die  Lehre  der  Gottesjurcht,  which 
therefore  is  called  the  science  or  knowledge  of  God.  Temporal 
happiness,  however,  may  be  sought  partly  in  subjective  contentment 
of  mind,  partly  in  external  repose  and  well-being,  also  health  and  a 
competence;  hence  various  treatments  of  these  subjects  have 
become  parts  of  practical  learning  (p.  15). 

Accordingly  Gerhard  enumerates,  with  some  indication  of 
their  respective  contents,  the  theory  of  virtue,  the  theory  of 
health,  "which  cannot  be  given  over  entirely  to  the  art  of 
medicine,  but  is  also  closely  related  with  the  theory  of  virtue," 
the  theory  of  justice  or  natural  law,  the  theory  of  morals,  and 
the  theory  of  the  state,  or  of  prudence.^     He  adds: 

Prudence  is  accordingly  nothing  else  than  a  theory  which  equips 
man  with  the  rational  keys  with  which  he  may  skilfully  and  system- 
atically employ  the  means  to  his  happiness  which  come  in  his  common 
life,  whereby  he  may  attain  the  indicated  end. 

And  a  little  later  he  further  explains: 

Accordingly  our  civic  science  is  chiefly  concerned  with  finding 
out  good  external  and  voluntary  means,  through  which,  without 
harm  or  injustice  to  others,  the  welfare  of  the  community  [gemdnen 
Wesens],  that  is,  the  permanence  and  security  of  the  same,  may  be 
properly  maintained,  promoted,  and  increased. 

On  the  basis  of  this  explanation  the  author  goes  into  further 
details  about  the  various  sciences  he  has  named,  and  especially 
their  dependence  upon  one  another.  In  this  latter  respect  his 
views  approach  much  closer  to  those  of  methodologists  today 
than  his  notions  of  divisions  of  labor  among  the  sciences. 
He  is  especially  definite  and  sagacious  in  showing  (chap,  iii) 
how  scholars  in  each  of  the  faculties  in  turn,  theology,  medicine, 

»  This  schedule  suggests  the  conceptions  which  Adam  Smith  appro- 
priated from  the  philosophy  in  which  he  was  trained.  Vide  Dugald 
Stewart,  Account  of  the  Life  and  Writings  of  Adam  Smith  (Bohn  ed., 
p.  zvii).  Fu^e  Small,  Adam  Smith  and  Modern  Sociology,  p.  32  et  passim. 


l8o  THE  CAMERALISTS 

philosophy,  and  law,  would  profit  by  the  study  of  social  science. 
It  is  hardly  too  much  to  say  that  these  few  pages  read  almost 
like  a  vision  of  the  development  of  sociological  consciousness 
which  has  been  manifest  during  the  past  generation.  Upon 
chap,  iv,  on  "Abuses  of  Civic  Science,"  a  similar  judgment  may 
be  passed.  Although  less  sophisticated,  it  is  very  much  in  the 
spirit  of  Herbert  Spencer's  essay,  The  Sins  of  Legislators. 

Chap.  V,  *'0n  the  Purpose,  Content,  and  Sub-Divisions  of 
Civic  Science,'"  begins  with  a  proposition  which  in  tenns  is 
two  centuries  in  advance  of  the  scientific  mediocrity  of  the 
author's  generation.  Although  we  may  not  read  into  it  all 
that  we  should  now  imply  by  such  language,  we  must  not  fail 
to  recognize  the  notable  breadth  of  view  which  the  most 
grudging  interpretation  would  have  to  concede.   Gerhard  says: 

In  order  to  realize  the  above  indicated  advantages,  and  to  avoid 
the  contrasted  abuses  of  civic  science,  it  is  necessary  never  to  leave 
the  i)urpose  of  the  same  out  of  sight.  The  duty  of  every  Politicus 
is  contained  in  the  rule:  "Whatsoever  thou  doest,  so  consider  the 
end  and  the  outcome  of  thy  devising,  that  thou  shalt  nevermore  do 
harm"  (p.  42). 

From  the  context  we  can  hardly  conclude  that  this  precept 
meant  less  in  principle  to  its  author  than  was  contained  in  one 
of  Herbert  Spencer's  wisest  sociological  aphorisms:  "The 
question  of  questions  for  the  politician  should  ever  be — 'What 
type  of  social  structure  am  I  tending  to  produce  ?'  But  this 
is  a  question  he  never  entertains."*  Gerhard's  next  paragraph 
reads: 

As  above  observed,  all  the  care  of  civic  science  should  be  directed 
toward  the  welfare  of  the  state.*  This  consists  principally  in  external 
peace  and  satisfaction,  so  far  as  these  can  be  maintained  by  natural 

»  "The  Coming  Slavery,"  in  Appleton's  edition  of  Social  Statics; 
The  Man  versus  the  State  (1893),  p.  313. 

*  "  Wohlseyn  des  Staates. "  Comments  on  this  and  related  phrase* 
will  be  reserved  until  we  reach  Justi;  vide  below,  pp.  404  3. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  GERHARD  i8i 

means,  without  illegal  offense  to  others.  It  is  not  to  be  believed  that 
the  first  men  who  subjected  themselves  to  a  human  scepter  surren- 
dered their  freedom  which  belonged  to  them  by  nature,  without  this 
intention.  If  now  worldly  governments  are  not  to  be  repugnant 
to  the  law  of  nature  and  the  eternal  decrees  [Rathschiage]  of  Almighty 
God,  their  counsels  must  also  seek  to  maintain  this  intention.  The 
greatest  emperors  and  princes  have  most  laudably  recognized  that 
subjects  were  not  created  for  their  benefit,  but  they  for  the  subjects. 
How  much  more  must  those  who  are  appointed  by  them  as  servants 
and  watchmen  of  the  common  well-being  [gemeinen  Wohlseyns] 
entertain  no  other  thoughts? 

In  the  next  paragraph  but  one  the  author  reduces  these 
generalities  to  somewhat  more  specific  form  in  this  way: 

Everything  which  preserves,  promotes,  and  makes  permanent 
common  repose  and  peace  with  pleasing  security  in  the  Republique 
in  permissible  and  righteous  ways,  that  must  with  all  care  and 
attention  be  undertaken  and  put  in  execution.  It  follows,  however, 
that  anything  which  is  in  any  degree  capable  of  hindering  common 
re|X)se  and  peace  must  be  omitted,  prevented,  and  excluded.  Who- 
ever reasonably  meditates  these  two  rules,  he  may  arrive  in  his  own 
head,  if  he  will  only  at  the  same  time  open  his  eyes  and  look  into 
the  worid,  at  a  reflection  of  all  civic  science.  Indeed,  means  will 
often  thereby  be  put  in  his  hand,  without  his  ^>ecial  attention,  for 
putting  this  science  into  useful  application. 

Then  follow  still  more  specific  reassertions  of  the  ends  of 
civic  society  as  represented  by  the  quasi-absolutistic  state,  and 
of  the  corresponding  outlook  of  civic  science  as  it  was  coming 
to  be  defined  in  cameralism.    Thus: 

Since  external  assaults  were  probably  the  chief  occasion  for  the 
first  raisonahlen  Republique,  political  sagacity  must  also  make  this 
its  first  care.  Hence  it  has  come  to  pass  that  the  principal  attention 
has  been  given  to  the  power  of  a  prince.  The  power  however  con- 
sists in  adequate  strength  to  protect  the  lands  which  belong  to  a 
state  against  assaults  of  its  neighbors.  Since  now,  in  the  judgment 
of  all,  people  and  money  are  necessary  for  this  purpose,  it  cannot  be 


l82  THE  CAMERALISTS 

denied  that  where  these  things  are  in  readiness  the  happiness  of  a 
country  is  thereby  quite  visibly  guaranteed  (p.  45). 

After  referring  at  some  length  to  the  other  side  of  the  case, 
viz.,  "where  there  is  the  greatest  power,  there  it  is  easiest  to  do 
wrong,"  Gerhard  once  more  formulates  the  essentials  of  civic 
policy  as  he  sees  it,  in  terms  of  "population,  money,  and 
friends." » 

Returning  to  the  subject  of  scientific  method,  Gerhard 
concludes,  quite  sanely: 

If  one  is  right  on  these  matters,  then  it  will  amount  to  one  and  the 
same  thing  whether  one  divides  civic  science  into  two  or  two  and 

twenty  parts There  is  no  harm  done  if,  for  the  sake  of 

grasping  the  concepts  more  thoroughly,  one  subdivides  the  matter 
a  little.  One  must  however  not  imagine  that  the  fate  of  the  Holy 
Roman  Empire  hangs  on  such  subdivisions;  and  quarrels  about 
such  arbitrary  matters  are  ridiculous.  Each  is  entitled  to  his  own 
way  of  dealing  with  the  subject,  and  although  it  is  well  to  fall  in  with 
the  prevailing  fashion,  yet  there  is  no  law  to  force  such  conformity 
upon  us;  if  there  were,  the  fashions  could  not  change  so  often.  In 
my  judgment,  there  would  be  no  harm  in  dividing  civic  science  into 
a  general  and  a  special  division,  for  there  are  rules  of  prudence  which 
apply  to  all  men  alike.  Each  has  on  the  contrary  his  own  reasons 
of  state,  and  the  special  portion  of  civic  science  may  have  as  many 
varieties  as  there  are  orders  of  society  in  the  world 

If  God  should  grant  me  opportunity  and  sufficient  experience 
to  develop  in  an  orderly  written  form  the  thoughts  on  civic  science 
which  I  have  thus  far  only  communicated  orally  to  my  students,  I 
would  first  set  in  order  the  general  rules  of  treatment.  I  would  then 
discuss  the  most  complete  society  of  the  Republique  in  accordance 
with  its  purpose,  and  finally  I  would  point  out  their  duties  to  the 
societies  that  occur  in  ordinary  life,  i.  e.,  of  married  people,  of 
parents  and  children,  of  masters  and  servants,  of  intermediate  rulers 
and  subjects.     Especially  would  I  picture  to  my  dearly  beloved 

<  Thereupon  he  quotes  with  approval  "  D.  Leib,  in  seinen  vitr 
Proben."     Vide  above,  p.  17a. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  GERHARD  183 

students  an  ideally  organized  student-state,  and  I  should  think  that 

in  so  doing  I  was  discharging  the  duty  of  an  upright  teacher 

As  to  the  subdivisions  of  the  second  (special)  part  of  the  science, 
they  would  require  many  sections.  It  is  however  not  necessary  to 
anticipate  them.  Whoever  understands  the  science  of  making  the 
subjects  numerous,  rich,  and  moral,  in  accordance  with  what  has 
preceded,  will  easily  find  out  for  himself  an  order  for  the  means 
thereto  necessary.  I  will  at  present  say  only  this  much:  that  to 
this  end  before  all  others  the  didactic  method  of  the  incomparable 
von  Seckendorff  seems  best  adapted.  In  his  Filrstenstaat  he  affords 
so  much  opportunity  for  profitable  comment  that  I  believe  my 
independent  efforts  in  connection  with  this  science  may  be  long 
deferred. 

Not  only  in  the  breadth  of  comprehension  which  these 
observations  indicate,  but  in  the  detail  of  seeing  a  place  for  a 
general  and  a  special  treatment  of  the  science  of  the  state, 
Gerhard  was  well  in  advance  of  his  time.  Justi  was  most 
successful  among  the  cameralists  in  making  use  of  this  sug- 
gestion. Gerhard  deserves  credit  for  perceptions  about 
scientific  technique  which  men  of  his  type  did  not  fully  appro- 
priate until  a  century  after  he  had  put  them  on  record.  In  so 
far  he  anticipated  the  established  practice  of  modem  German 
scholars  in  all  the  social  sciences. 

It  is  also  not  too  much  to  say  that,  in  his  brief  discussion  of 
the  subjects  which  should  be  studied  in  connection  with  civic 
science  (pp.  53  ff.),  Gerhard  showed  breadth  of  intelligence, 
if  not  insight  into  detail,  equal  to  that  afterward  exhibited  by 
Justi.  Indeed,  it  is  plain  that  the  former  had  a  much  broader 
foundation  for  his  special  programme  of  civic  science  than  the 
latter.  Justi  furnishes  no  clear  evidence  that  his  foundations 
were  as  strong  as  those  on  which  Gerhard  rests  when  he  says: 

Accordingly  it  is  right  to  say  that  civic  science  begins  where 
moral  philosophy  ends,  and  it  sufficiently  appears  that  the  student 
of  politics,  before  he  can  become  a  statesman,  must  be  a  student  of 
moral  philosophy.    Whoever  does  this  with  reason  and  at  the  right 


1 84  THE  CAMERALISTS 

time,  while  the  tree  is  still  capable  of  being  inclined,  and  thereby  is 
properly  molded  in  justice,  good  manners,  honor,  and  the  fear  of 
God:    if  he  otherwise  has  good  understanding,  will  not  find  any 

portion  of  civic  science  difficult To   sum   up   the  whole 

matter:  Whoever  will  learn  civic  science  to  advantage,  let  him  first 
learn  to  understand  other  men,  the  forces  of  nature,  and  the  estab- 
lished institutions  of  the  world.  Then  civic  science  can  teach  him 
besides  nothing  but  the  ways  in  which  he  may  best  apply  such 
intelligence  (p.  57). 

Gerhard  may  also  be  observed  to  advantage  as  an  index  of 
the  extent  to  which  there  was  at  his  time  a  recognized  camera- 
listic  tradition  in  academic  circles.  Those  who  wish  to  pursue 
the  subject  farther  than  our  present  limits  permit,  should  read 
the  Appendix  of  Gerhard's  syllabus.  It  is  a  fair  index  both 
of  the  poverty  and  of  the  progress  of  German  thought  in  this 
subject  at  the  opening  of  the  eighteenth  century. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

THE  CAMERALISTICS  OF  ROHR 

In  a  period  which  discriminated  more  carefully  between 
dilettanteish  and  critical  writing,  the  subject  of  this  chapter 
would  hardly  have  attained  prominence  among  specialists. 
Because  of  the  attention  which  was  actually  paid  to  him  by  a 
considerable  number  of  successors,  he  cannot  be  omitted  from 
our  account.  Intrinsically  he  does  not  deserve  mention  with 
cameralistic  writers  of  the  first  rank. 

Inama*  furnishes  a  biographical  sketch  to  this  effect: 

Julius  Bemhard  von  Rohr  was  the  son  of  a  country  gentleman 
(Ritterguisbesiizer),  Julius  Albert  von  Rohr.  He  was  bom  in  1688 
and  died  in  1742.  His  education  was  carefully  planned.  At  the 
age  of  seventeen  he  was  sent  to  the  University  of  Leipzig,  where  he 
studied  law,  mathematics,  chemistry,  physics,  and  Oekonomik. 
After  ending  his  studies  he  went  with  his  father  to  Hamburg,  to 
get  acquainted  with  the  business  organization  of  that  city.  He 
became  an  attach^  of  the  delegation  sent  to  Frankfurt  for  the  imperial 
election  of  1712.  The  death  of  his  father  and  the  embarrassed 
condition  of  the  estate  presently  put  him  on  a  very  limited  income. 
He  went  to  Halle  to  study  mathematics  with  Wolf;  in  17 13  to  Hol- 
land; in  1714  he  received  a  position  as  member  of  the  Stijls-  und 
Erblands-Regierung  at  Magdeburg;  in  1726  was  transferred  to  a 
similar  position  at  Niederlausitz;  in  1731  became  herzo^licher 
Landkammerrath;  in  1732  Domhtrr  zu  Merseberg,  but  the  fX)sition 
seems  to  have  secured  his  standing  rather  than  to  have  furnished  an 
occupation.  He  had  been  on  the  waiting-list  for  this  sort  of  eccle- 
siastical preferment  since  he  was  two  years  old.  He  became  a  mem- 
ber of  the  Landkammer  at  Merseberg,  where  he  remained  till  his 
retirement  in  1738. 

Rohr  somehow  managed  to  retrieve  his  financial  fortunes  to  such 
an  extent  that  he  accumulated  a  library  for  that  time  rather  rich, 
'  In  All.  d.  Bib.,  in  loc. 

185 


l86  THE  CAMERALISTS 

and  also  in  1720  acquired  a  landed  estate  between  Dresden  and 
Meissen,  where  he  carried  on  wine  culture,  horticulture,  and  agri- 
culture. He  had  troubled  relations  with  a  mistress,  1724-39.  He 
married  another  woman  in  1739,  and  wrote  his  friends  an  elaborate 
explanation  of  his  domestic  affairs.' 

Rohr  is  credited  with  the  authorship  of  twenty-nine  pub- 
lished works,  and  of  nine  others  left  in  an  unfinished  state.' 

According  to  Inama,  doubtless  because  of  the  author's  remark 
on  the  second  page  of  the  Vorrede  to  the  Haushaliungsbibliotliek, 
Rohr  spoke  of  Hauswirthschajlskunsi,  on  the  basis  of  natural  science, 
as  the  chief  task  of  his  life.  In  his  conception  of  political  science 
he  was  a  devoted  admirer  of  Seckendorff;  in  his  more  concrete 
camcralistics  he  was  equally  attached  to  Schroder.  "  Under  the 
influence  of  Wolf's  eudaemonism  he  advanced  in  many  respects 
beyond  either."  Under  the  same  influence  he  escaped  some  of  the 
poverty  of  the  old  Hausvdierlilieratur,  and  on  the  other  hand  his 
knowledge  of  natural  science  was  a  factor  in  promoting  the  develop- 
ment of  cameralism.  In  particular,  he  was  of  service  in  preparing 
the  way  for  academic  cameralism,  which  Dithmar  and  Gasser  were 
permitted  to  introduce  into  the  Prussian  universities. 

Roscher  (p.  378)  speaks  of  the  Compendieuse  Haushal- 
tungshihliothek  as  Rohr's  "chief  work."  If  there  can  be  a 
"chief"    among    mediocrities,    that    designation    can    hardly 

'  In  comparison  with  this  account,  it  is  surprising  that  Roscher  did 
not  probe  beyond  the  misleading  contents  of  the  note  (p.  178):  "Er 
lebtc  unvermahlt,  mit  vie!  Bijchcrn,  Correspondenz  und  Reisen,  als 
Domhcrr  zu  Merseberg."  For  our  interests,  Rohr's  life  ended  before 
this  ap[X)intment. 

»  Zedlcr,  Universallexicon,  in  loc.  Chief  among  these  wen":  (i) 
Compendieuse  Haushaltungshihliothek  (17 16;  2.  Ausg.,  1726;  3.  Ausg., 
17.VS);  (2)  Physikalische  Bihliolhek  (1724;  2.  Aufl.,  1754);  Rohr  pro- 
jected a  M (UhemcUische  Bihliolhek,  "since  these  three  sciences  are  united 
by  an  inseparable  }>ond;"  (3)  Einleitung  zur  Staatsklugheit  (1718);  (4) 
Einleilung  zur  Ceremonial-Wissenschaft  der  Privatpersonen  (1728);  (5) 
Einleitung  zur  Ceremonial-Wixsenschafl  der  grossen  Herrn  (1729);  (6) 
Ohersfichsisches  Haunrirthscha/lshuch  (1722);  (7)  Haushallungsrecht 
(i732t  1734;    2  Bande;    2.  Aufl.,  1738). 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ROHR  187 

remain  in  this  case  where  Roscher  placed  it.  He  does  not 
seem  to  have  been  acquainted  with  Rohr's  more  pretentious 
works.  The  Haushaltungsbibliothek,^  even  in  the  "much 
enlarged"  third  edition,  is  a  small  handbook  of  692  pages.  It 
uses  the  word  Oeconomie  as  synonymous  with  its  general 
subject-matter.  In  the  dedication  to  Kreishauptmann  Peter 
Freyherr  von  Hohenthal,  the  author  says: 

While  writers  on  management  [oconomische]  have  remained  as 
a  rule  unread  by  the  learned,  because  they  considered  them  too  low, 
and  by  housekeepers,  because  they  found  them  too  high,  the  useful 
instruction  which  you  [Ew.  Hochwohlgebornen]  have  instituted  shows 
how  many  objects  not  only  of  important  but  also  of  ingenious  investi- 
gation Oeconomie  contains,  and  how  little  one  who  is  uninformed  is 
competent  to  conduct  with  success  occupations  which  demand  so 
much  knowledge  and  reflection.' 

The  author's  Preface  to  the  second  edition,  dated  August 
9,  1726,  declares  that  the  first  edition  had  been  well  received 
by  the  public,  and  that  certain  scholars  in  the  universities  had 
done  it  the  honor  of  lecturing  upon  it.  The  explanation  of  the 
author's  intention  in  citing  books  which  could  actually  be  used 
in  household  and  agricultural  management  has  an  important 
bearing  upon  the  myth  which  the  critics  of  mercantilism  have 
propagated,  that  there  was  no  attention  to  agriculture  and  no 
thought  of  it.  At  this  time  there  were  not  only  many  writings 
on  the  subject,  but  they  were  not  so  very  difficult  to  obtain, ^ 
and  Rohr's  book  refers  to  the  most  available  of  them. 

«  Julius  Bernhards  von  Rohr,  Merseb.  Domherrn  und  LanrJ- 
Cammerraths  Haushallungs  Bibliothek  worinnen  die  vornehmsten 
Schriften,  die  zur  Haushaltungskunst  gehoren,  angezeiget  warden. 
Dritte  und  viel  vermehrte  .\uflage,  1755.  I  have  not  seen  a  copy  of  the 
original   edition  of   17 16. 

»  This  passage  is  one  of  the  clearest  reflections  of  the  meanings 
attached  at  this  time  to  variations  of  the  term  Oeconomie.  It  meant 
plain  vulgar  thrift,  and  then  the  beginnings  of  systematic  thinking  about 
thrift. 

3  We  shall  return  to  this  point  in  connection  with  later  writers. 
Vide  p.  256  below. 


l88  THE  CAMERALISTS 

In  the  Vorrede  of  the  third  edition,  1755,  the  editor  shows 
that  in  his  mind  the  word  Oeconomie  still  stands  for  a  very 
concrete  type  of  technology,  not  for  the  sort  of  generalization 
which  later  appropriated  the  term.     He  says: 

If  we  think  of  Oeconomie,  not  as  it  is  practiced  by  the  lowest 
portion  of  housekeepers  [Hausttnrthe],  but  rather  as  that  which  it 
actually  is,  an  art  whose  prescriptions  are  based  upon  knowledge  of 
nature,  and  which  can  be  properly  exercised  and  extended  only  by 
means  of  this  knowledge,  then  it  deserves  a  respectable  place  among 
the  learned  sciences.  It  requires  also  for  its  completeness  the  appli- 
cation of  various  other  parts  of  human  knowledge,  and  the  learning 
of  that  which  predecessors  have  done;  that  is,  books  must  be  read. 

As  a  cameralistic  book,  in  the  proper  sense,  the  Haushal- 
tungsbiblioihek  would  not  deserve  mention.  As  an  index  of 
the  relation  between  the  subjects  known  at  the  time  as  Oecono- 
mie and  Cafneralwissenschaft  in  general,  it  is  highly  instructive. 
A  glance  at  the  Table  of  Contents  would  sufl&ciently  fix  this 
relation.  A  few  sentences  from  the  text  may  be  added  without 
comment.    The  opening  sentence  of  the  first  chapter  declares: 

The  art  of  managing  the  household  [Haushaltungskunsf]  is  a 
practical  science  (sic),  which  teaches  how  one  in  a  proper  way  may 
acquire  money  and  goods  [Geld  und  Gut],  may  conserve  and  wisely 
expend  what  is  acquired,  for  the  promotion  or  maintenance  of  one's 
temporal  happiness. 

Sec.  2  of  the  same  chapter  continues: 

The  art  of  managing  the  household  may  be  divided  into  the 
Oeconomica  of  princes  and  of  private  persons.  In  the  former  case 
it  is  called  Cameral-Finanz-  und  DomainenvHssenschaft.  It  consists 
in  a  prudence  not  only  in  administering  his  own  means  and  revenues 
and  those  of  his  land,  and  in  maintaining  the  community,  but  also 

in  adding  to  the   money  and  goods  of  the  subjects The 

house  management  of  private  persons  may  again  be  divided  into 
city  and  country  management  [Stadt-  und  Landwirthschajtskunst]. 
Under  the  former  head  I  reckon  knowledge  of  the  coins,  of  trans- 
actions with  money,  skill  in   keeping  everything  in  order  in  the 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ROHR  189 

house,  and  in  placing  the  furniture  in  the  rooms  according  to  sym- 
metry and  use,  proper  supply  of  the  table,  temperate  use  of  drinks, 
wise  control  of  servants,  etc.  Such  things  occur  also  in  the  country, 
but  because  these  arrangements  can  be  made  without  possessing 
estates  [liegende  Giiter],  I  will  not  attribute  them  properly  to  rural 
management,  which  involves  immovable  landed  property.  Of  this 
in  general  the  so-called  housekeeping  books  [Haushaltungsbiicher] 
treat,  and  the  same  consists  in  knowledge  of  agriculture,  of  cattle 
raising,  of  fisheries,  hunting,  forests,  gardening,  vineyards,  etc. 
This  latter  is  much  more  comprehensive  and  difficult  than  the  former, 
for  whoever  has  the  skill  to  carry  on  management  in  the  country  can 
quickly  learn  city  management.  On  the  contrary,  whoever  comes 
from  the  city  to  the  country,  unless  he  has  particular  zeal  and  guid- 
ance, will  find  it  hard  to  adapt  himself  to  rural  management. 

Both  city  and  country  management  embrace  three  parts,  namely 
skill  (i)  to  acquire  money  and  goods,  (2)  to  retain  what  is  acquired, 
and  (3)  wisely  to  expend  it.' 

As  cumulative  evidence  on  the  general  position  of  the 
cameralists,  the  opening  sentence  of  the  second  chapter  is  in 
order.    It  is  the  author's  definition  of  cameral  science,  viz.: 

Cameral  science  {Cameralwissenschaft)  teaches  princes  not  only 
well  to  conserve  and  increase  their  means,  but  also  to  promote  their 
subjects'  happiness  and  to  order  their  management  {Qeconomie). 

Then  the  motive  of  Schroder's  civic  philosophy  reappears 
in  this  form  (chap,  ii,  §4): 

The  best  means  of  enriching  a  land  is  to  take  care  that  many 
people  are  drawn  into  the  land,  and  also  that  all  the  subjects  through 
diligent  labor  may  have  their  support  and  means  of  gain  [Nahrung 
und  Erwerh]. 

These  citations  show  the  general  character  of  this  book  of 
homely  wisdom.  After  Rohr  had  written  this  earlier  book, 
his  notions  of  his  vocation  seem  to  have  become  more  ambitious. 

'  This  last  prop>osition  is  notable  because,  although  it  seems  to  be 
a  platitude,  it  expresses  the  common-sense  which  became  one  of  the 
working  premises  of  nearly  all  the  later  cameralists. 


igo  THE  CAMERALISTS 

He  did  not  confine  himself  to  "management"  in  the  narrower 
sense  of  his  first  programme.  We  may  therefore  find  an 
expansion  of  his  ideas  in  another  book.  Though  it  contains 
nothing  original  with  the  author,  it  won  him  not  a  little  recog- 
nition among  later  cameralists.' 

Previous  to  publication  of  the  books  we  have  named,  Rohr 
had  neither  academic  nor  governmental  experience  to  be 
compared  with  that  of  most  of  the  cameralists;  and  his  forms 
of  expression  are  visibly  apologetic  toward  each  of  the  classes 
by  which  he  was  doubtless  rated  as  an  amateur.     He  writes 

'  Julij  Bernhards  von  Rohr  Einleitung  zur  Staats-Klugheit,  oder: 
Vorstellung  Wie  Christliche  und  iveise  Regenten  zur  Beforderung  ihrer 
eigenen  und  ihres  Landes  Gliickseeligkeit  Ihre  Unterthanen  zu  heherrschen 
pflegen.  Mil  Kdnigl.  Pohln.  und  Clurfl.  Siichss.  allergn.  Privilegio. 
Leipzig,  17 18.  In  his  Vorrede,  Rohr  speaks  of  a  previous  book,  Ein- 
leitung zur  Klugheit  zu  leben,  darinnen  ich  jungen  Leuten  einige  Regeln 
der  Privat- Klugheit  beybringen  woUen.  The  author  refers  to  the  present 
volume  as  a  companion  book,  designed  for  the  use  of  beginners  in  the 
study  of  Staats-Klugheit.  He  says  that  the  book  is  quite  different  from 
SeckendorfTs  Teutschen  Fiirsten-Staate,  which  had  been  "up  to  that 
time  much  read  by  the  Germans,  and  to  good  advantage."  Rohr  makes 
this  difference  consist  first,  in  describing  not  only  what  Christian  princes 
have  done  in  the  way  of  wise  and  just  administration,  but  also  what  they 
might  well  cease  to  do;  and  second,  Rohr  says  that  Seckendorff  com- 
posed his  Vxx)k  more  as  a  moral  than  as  a  political  treatise;  that  is,  he 
showed  what  a  ruler  would  do  in  pursuance  of  civic  law,  if  he  acted  in 
accordance  with  his  conscience  and  his  duty  to  God,  and  his  obligations 
to  his  country,  but  he  difl  not  show  the  means  by  which  the  tasks  of 
government  are  to  be  carried  out  in  detail.  Rohr  claims  also  that  his 
lxx)k  treats  of  many  subjects  which  Seckendorff  neglected.  At  the  same 
time  he  concedes  to  Seckendorff's  works  a  rank  above  his  own.  He 
explains  also  that  he  has  had  the  Evangelical  Lutheran  states  chiefly  in 
mind,  because  in  the  Catholic  states  the  doctrines  of  Staats-Klugheit 
are  concerned  with  somewhat  different  objects,  and  rest  upon  quite 
different  principles.  Bcsirles  Seckendorff,  Rohr  says  that  he  has  usc<l 
particularly  S(hr6<lcr,  I>eib,  Marperger,  "the  learned  and  eminent 
authors  of  the  Unschuldigen  Nachrichten,"  Herr  I).  Dohler,  Hr. 
Horn. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ROHR  IQI 

rather  as  an  essayist  than  as  a  technologist.  On  the  one  hand 
the  systematic  method  of  the  academic  thinker  is  lacking,  and 
on  the  other  hand  the  firm  touch  of  the  man  accustomed  to  deal 
directly  with  affairs.  He  can  be  included  among  the  cameral- 
ists  only  as  an  evidence  of  the  impressions  which  the  cameral- 
ism both  of  the  bureaus  and  of  the  books  had  made  up  to  his 
date  upon  a  university  man  of  a  rather  refined  type.  Granting 
that  he  helped  to  gain  a  hearing  for  cameralism  in  the  univer- 
sities, there  is  no  evidence  that  he  exerted  a  distinct  influence 
upon  the  development  of  the  theory  itself.'  The  Kinleitutig, 
however,  would  be  an  extremely  valuable  collection  of  material 
for  the  student  of  the  culture  history  of  the  period. 

The  book  is  a  compact  volume  of  1,474  pages,  with  a  table 
of  contents  and  index  filling  thirty  more  pages.  The  plate 
opposite  the  title-page  represents  a  king  upon  his  throne,  at 
his  right  female  figures  symbolizing  Religion  and  Justice,  at 
his  left  Peace  and  Prudence,  and  below  the  couplet: 

Wenn  ein  Regente  will  des  Landes  Wolfarth  baucn, 
Mus  er  auf  Gottesfurcht,  Justiz  und  Klugheit  schauen. 

The  opening  paragraph  reads: 

Prudence  [Klugheil]  is  an  adaptability  of  temix^r  by  which  actions 
are  directed  with  reason  and  foresight  toward  the  promotion  of  true 
happiness.  It  discovers  means  by  which,  without  prejudice  and 
hindrance  to  others,  one  may  most  conveniently  and  easily  attain 
and  preserve  happiness.  Because  it  aims  at  true  happiness,  it 
proposes  first  eternal  and  second  temporal  happiness  as  its  chief 
and  subordinate  aim.  It  is  otherwise  called  die  Politic,  and  is 
either  a  true  or  a  false  prudence. 

The  looseness  of  thinking  in  this  paragraph  may  be  taken  as 

'  The  copy  of  the  Einleitung  which  I  have  studied  was  borrowed 
from  the  Royal  Library  at  Berlin.  While  it  is  much  discolored  by  age, 
it  shows  no  signs  of  use.  Indeed  many  of  the  leaves  had  evidently  never 
been  separated  since  they  left  the  bindery,  and  a  considerable  number, 
including  one  containing  a  part  of  the  Table  of  Contents,  were  uncut ! 


192  THE  CAMERALISTS 

an  index  of  the  quality  of  the  book.  The  ambiguity  that  is 
involved  in  making  the  same  word  stand  for  "adaptability  of 
temper"  and  ''Politic^'  is  symptomatic  of  the  style  throughout. 
The  author  is  popular  rather  than  analytic  in  his  treatment. 
He  can  be  accepted  therefore  merely  as  in  certain  respects  a 
sign  of  the  times,  but  not  as  a  factor  in  the  development  of 
cameralistic  theory  or  technology.  This  popular  and  uncritical 
quality  is  even  more  apparent  in  the  second  paragraph,  viz.: 

The  true  prudence  demands  nothing  except  that  to  which  it  may 
properly  lay  claim  according  to  divine  and  natural  law;  it  subor- 
dinates the  will,  as  much  as  possible,  when  it  would  go  to  excess, 
and  for  the  accomplishment  of  its  purposes  it  uses  permissible  means. 
Its  aim  is  the  well-being  of  itself  {sic)  and  of  other  men  {sic)\  yet  it 
recognizes,  in  case  of  collision  between  its  own  and  its  neighbor's 
fortunes,  that  the  preference  belongs  to  itself  [!  ].  It  [Kluoheit]  sees 
from  its  own  experience  and  that  of  others  that  all  temporal  happi- 
ness, however  plausible,  is  associated  with  much  unrest,  is  fluid  and 
fleeting,  and  that  it  quite  unconsciously  slips  out  of  the  hands  of  its 
possessors. 

Thus  while  the  b(K)k  contains  much  that  might  have  been 
instructive  to  certain  types  of  mind,  in  early  stages  of  education, 
it  is  not  to  be  taken  seriously  as  a  samf)le  of  the  academic  or 
professional  thinking  of  the  author's  generation.  It  belongs 
in  the  class  once  known  as  "edifying,"  rather  than  among 
technological  treatises. 

Rohr  distinguishes  "the  j)rudence  of  private  persons"  from 
"that  of  the  reigning  princes"  (p.  lo).  The  former  was 
treated  in  the  book  named  above,'  the  latter  is  the  subject 
of  the  present  volume.  M(jre  particularly,  the  prudence  of 
the  reigning  prince,  or  civic  prudence  [Staats-Klugheit]  is 
described  as: 

the  adaptability  of  the  understanding,  by  means  of  which  rulers  are 
capa}>le  of  promoting  not  only  their  own  but  all  their  subjects'  true 
happiness  (p.  ii). 

'  Vide  aVxjve,  p.  igo.     Klugheit  zu  lehen. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ROHR  193 

The  division  of  civic  prudence  into  general  and  special, 
which  we  find  first  clearly  stated  by  Gerhard,  is  adopted  by 
Rohr,  but  whether  or  not  he  was  in  any  way  indebted  for  the 
idea  to  the  earlier  writer  does  not  appear.  His  distinction, 
while  apparently  the  same,  is  really  not  along  the  same  lines  as 
Gerhard's.  Rohr  calls  application  of  the  rules  of  general  civic 
prudence  to  a  given  state  "special  civic  prudence,"  instead  of 
grasping  the  conception  of  more  general  and  less  general 
principles  which  may  in  their  way  be  applicable  to  all  states. 
Indeed  he  does  not  seem  to  realize  that  there  is  a  place  for 
general  principles,  other  than  religious  doctrines  or  moral 
truisms,  upon  which  details  of  civic  polity  must  rest.  Instead, 
he  assumes  that  one  may  be  a  specialist  in  civic  science  by 
simply  selecting  a  fraction  of  it  as  his  task: 

Just  as  it  is  impossible  that  a  man,  however  diligent,  should 
cultivate  all  civic  prudence  completely:  so  it  is  well  done  if  each 
should  pursue  those  parts  for  which  he  has  inclination,  talent,  and 
opportunity  (p.  33). 

Rohr  bases  his  essay  without  hesitation  upon  the  idea  of 
the  patriarchal  prerogative  of  the  prince: 

Just  as  a  ruling  prince  presents  two  moral  persons,  first  a  private 
person,  who  in  many  acts  must  conform  himself  to  other  private 
persons,  yet  also  is  to  be  considered  as  a  prince,  who  has  to  direct  the 
conduct  of  his  subjects,  he  must  consequently  be  versed  in  both 
private  and  public  prudence  (p.  34). 

That  the  book  is  rather  rhetorical  than  technical  is  illus- 
trated again  in  the  next  paragraph : 

The  chief  task  of  the  prudence  of  a  ruler  consists  in  always  seeking 
to  combine  his  happiness  with  that  of  his  subjects,  and  in  striving 
to  prevent  them  from  becoming  separated.  The  prosperity  of  a 
ruler  which  is  not  founded  on  the  weal  of  his  land  is  of  no  perma- 
nence, as  is  shown  by  many  ancient  and  modem  histories.  He  must 
have  the  prosperity  of  his  subjects  in  view  in  all  his  actions,  and  must 
undertake  nothing  which  is  inconsistent  with  the  same. 


194  THE  CAMERALISTS 

At  the  same  time,  Rohr  quite  as  distinctly  affirms  the 
absolutism  of  rulers.     Thus: 

In  case  of  a  collision  between  his  own  interest  and  the  welfare 
of  the  subjects,  from  love  for  his  land,  in  order  to  promote  the  common 
interest  [gemeinschajjtlichc  Interesse]  he  must  subordinate  his  own 
interest.  He  thereby  not  only  wins  the  love  of  his  subjects,  but  he 
does  that  to  which  he  is  appointed  of  God.  And  while  sovereigns  are 
not  bound  to  render  account  for  their  actions  to  anyone  in  the  world, 
yet  they,  as  well  as  their  subjects,  have  over  them  the  supreme  ruler 
in  heaven,  to  whom  at  the  great  day  of  judgment  they  must  give 
answer. 

While  the  author  reiterates  on  the  one  hand  the  sonorous 
principle,  ^^ScUus  poptdi  must  be  the  law  of  the  prince,"  yet 
on  the  other  hand  he  unconsciously  betrays  the  rendering  which 
the  spirit  of  the  time  tended  to  give  to  the  principle,  when  he 
says: 

The  art  of  government  is  in  fact  an  art  above  all  arts;  because 
it  can  make  kingdoms  out  of  principalities  and  empires  out  of  king- 
doms, can  raise  a  sunken  state  to  its  former  splendor,  and  through 
this  rare  j)ower  of  making  a  prince  really  great  it  proves  itself  the 
true  statecraft. 

In  the  following  section  (p.  37)  Duke  Ernst  of  Gotha, 
Seckendorff's  master,  is  cited  as  a  type  of  the  Christian  prince, 
and  as  evidence  that  piety  is  necessary  for  the  success  of  a  ruler. 
No  mention  is  made  at  this  point  of  Seckendorff,  however, 
from  whom  it  is  probable  that  Rohr  derived  the  substance  of 
his  political  ideas.  For  example,  the  sections  in  which  he 
describes  the  duties  of  a  prince  in  general,  especially  §§7-19, 
merely  render  Seckendorfl's  views  in  slightly  varied  terms, 
and  with  trifling  additions  of  detail  or  illustration.  It  amounts 
to  no  proper  acknowledgment  to  the  man  who  furnished  the 
thoughts  when  at  last,  in  §18,  his  name  is  used  in  connection 
with  the  least  important  item  in  the  whole  programme,  viz., 
the  rccreatiims  of  the  prince ! 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ROHR  195 

Since  Rohr  was  not  a  camcralist,  Ijut  merely  a  contemporary 
popularizer  of  cameralism,  we  repeat  that  he  is  worth  our 
notice  merely  as  secondary  evidence  bearing  upon  the  impres- 
sion which  technical  cameralism  had  made  upon  the  thinking 
of  men  at  one  remove  from  the  more  technical  writers. 

In  a  confused  paragraph  (p.  71)  the  author  raises  but  docs 
not  distinctly  answer  the  question: 

In  case  a  reigning  prince  violates  his  fundamental  pledges  lo  his 
subjects,  have  they  a  right  to  resist?  Rohr  first  remarks,  "It  is 
well  known  that  those  who  withstand  the  divinely  appointed  author- 
ities resist  the  divine  order,"  and  he  draws  the  conclusion  that  a 
perfidious  prince  should  be  left  rather  to  divine  justice  than  forcibly 
dealt  with  by  his  subjects.  Without  much  assurance  that  the  next 
recourse  is  very  promising,  he  points  out  that  the  constitution  of  the 
Empire  calls  for  judgment  by  imperial  authorities  upon  a  prince  who 
disturbs  or  threatens  the  order  of  the  Empire  by  not  keeping  faitli 
with  his  subjects.  Pushing  the  hypothesis  to  the  extreme  form, 
that  "the  excesses  of  the  prince  make  the  life  of  a  virtuous  subject 
insecure,"  Rohr  ventures  the  very  cautious  judgment  that  in  such 
case  one  is  justified  in  resisting  the  prince.  He  immediately  adds: 
"  If  the  ruler  goes  only  so  far,  however,  as  lo  devise  against  one  anrl 
another  private  person  things  contrary  to  God  and  to  natural  decency 
[Krbarkcit],  such  subjects  must  rather  depart  from  the  country,  or 
bear  the  injustice  with  patience,  than  oppose  the  majesty  of  their 
ruling  sovereign  with  violence."  The  whole  discussion  of  contracts 
to  which  a  ruler  is  a  party  is  conducted  upon  a  shifting  basis  of  theo 
logical  dogma,  ethical  generality,  and  amateurish  legalism.  In 
modem  vernacular,  it  amounts  to  a  whitewashing  rei^rt  uf)on  the 
political  status  quo,  under  the  form  of  an  imf)arlial  inquiry  into 
alternatives. 

The  fourth  chapter  {"Von  dem  Oeronomie  U'e.sen^')  is 
worth  notice  as  a  further  index  to  the  current  sense  of  the  term 
Oeconomie.  As  we  try  to  make  evident  throughout  this  analy- 
sis, the  readiness  with  which  this  and  similar  terms  have  been 
translated    from    German   into    English    words   which    were 


196  THE  CAMERALISTS 

equivalent  in  appearance,  but  not  in  sense,  has  been  a  serious 
hindrance  to  prof)er  insight  into  the  meaning  of  German 
sociological  evolution.  The  one  point  to  be  emphasized  here 
is  that  nowhere,  in  the  'series  of  writers  interpreted  in  this 
study,  did  any  variation  of  the  ^ord  Oeconomie  have  the  force 
carried  by  the  English  derivative  from  the  same  root  in  the 
phrase  "political  economy."  In  the  whole  usage  of  the 
cameralists  Oeconomie  was  primarily  thrifty  management,  as 
measured  by  the  prevailing  standards  of  household  or  public 
prudence.  Oeconomie  was  literally  housekeeping  {Haus- 
haltung,  Haushaltungskunst,  etc.),  and  this  conception  clung 
to  it,  whether  the  immediate  reference  was  to  thrift  in  the 
household,  on  the  farm,  in  artisanship,  trade,  or  government. 
Oeconomie  was  never,  until  the  period  of  Smithism,  generalized 
and  deepened  into  consideration  of  problems  underneath 
rule-of-thumb  wisdom.  With  this  in  mind,  we  find  in  Rohr's 
approach  to  the  subject  of  Oeconomie-Wesen  an  instructive 
guide  to  the  plane  of  interests  which  held  the  attention  of  men 
of  affairs,  both  industrial  and  governmental,  before  the  stage 
of  critical  and  philosophical  interpretation  of  economics.  He 
opens  the  chapter  in  this  way: 

Just  as  private  persons  fill  their  storerooms  by  orderly  and 
reasonable  management  [Haushalten],  so  that  they  can  draw  one 
supply  after  another;  in  the  same  way  with  ruling  princes,  if  they 
attend  to  their  FiirsUichen  Oeconomie  und  Cameral-Wesen  in  a  proper 
manner,  the  happiness  not  only  of  their  own  persons  and  of  their 
families,  but  also  of  their  subjects,  which  must  always  be  connected 
with  their  own,  will  be  promoted  and  secured.  In  the  case  of  princely 
persons  a  double  Oeconomica  must  have  place,  ....  first,  the 

Oeconomica    of   private   persons In   this   connection    they 

must  take  care  that  the  sums  which  they  lend  [Capitalien]  are 
securely  invested  and  kept  in  good  circulation  [rotdiren].  They 
must  administer  their  domains  to  good  advantage,  apportion  the 
outlays  reasonably  and  see  that  they  are  balanced  by  the  income, 
and  always  take  care  that  a  margin  remains.    That  which  God  has 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ROHR  197 

given  them  they  must  conserve,  in  order  that  it  may  not  be  imp)aired 
or  lost,  etc.  In  all  this  they  must  give  exact  heed  to  the  same  rules 
and  cautions  which  private  persons  must  observe.  Beyond  this 
there  is,  second,  the  FUrsUiche  Oeconomica,  since  princes  must  not 
only  pay  attention  to  increase  and  preservation  of  their  private 
incomes,  but  also  to  enlargement  and  preservation  of  the  happiness 
and  goods  of  their  subjects. 

Then  follows  non-technical  description  of  the  administra- 
tive machinery  which  the  cameralists  had  begun  to  analyze 
more  precisely.  Rohr  explains  the  Oeconomie-Wesen  of 
rulers  as  an  affair  of  two  divisions,  distribuendo  et  augendo, 
on  the  one  hand  of  applying  the  revenues,  on  the  other  of 
raising  them.  He  uses  the  term  Cameralisten  for  those 
officials  who  have  the  former  division  in  charge,  and  explains 
that  a  quite  different  body  of  persons  should  be  employed  in 
the  other  division.  Thus  he  thinks  (p.  99)  that  Cameral-Sachen 
should  be  divided  into  two  distinct  collegia — the  division, 
by  the  way,  not  according  precisely  with  the  distribution  of 
functions  projK)sed  by  the  author  a  few  lines  before — the  one, 
called  the  Cammer  proper,  to  collect  and  disburse  the  reveunes, 
the  other  exclusively  to  deliberate  how  to  increase  the  revenues. 
He  claims  that  the  usual  union  of  these  two  collegia  in  a  single 
Cammer  is  harmful  and  costly.'  Rohr  goes  into  detail  about 
cameralistic  technique  as  though  he  were  an  expert,  but  our 
purpose  does  not  require  attention  to  the  technological  side  of 
cameralism,  and  if  it  did  we  should  be  concerned  not  with  the 
expositions  of  amateurs  like  Rohr,  but  with  those  of  men  who 
could  speak  with  authority. 

A  glance  at  Rohr's  table  of  contents  would  show  that  the 
personality  of  the  prince,  and  dynastic  policy,  are  made  the 
center  from  which  the  remainder  of  the  book  proceeds.  While 
this  at  once  condemns  the  book,  from  the  standpoint  of  the 

I  At  this  point  the  author  appeals  to  the  second  chapter  of  Schro- 
der's FUrsUiche  Schatt-  und  Renth-Cammtr. 


iqS  the  cameralists 

modern  social  theorist,  it  affords  the  very  evidence  which  makes 
the  book  valuable  to  the  historical  interj)retcr.  This  para- 
mount value  of  government,  and  of  the  prince  as  incarnating 
government,  is  fundamental  in  the  whole  camcralislic  regime 
and  theory.  It  is  the  pass-key  to  the  whole  system.  Came- 
ralism as  a  technique  and  as  a  theory  was  a  means  developed 
in  the  interest  of  an  end  visualized  first  and  foremost  in  the 
person  of  the  i)rince,  if  never  absolutely  identical  with  the  prince 
and  his  interests.  In  respect  to  this  one  factor,  the  develop- 
ment of  German  civilization,  not  to  carry  the  generalization 
at  this  point  beyond  Germany,  was  a  progressive  realization  of 
other  values  in  society  besides  those  of  rulers  and  governments, 
and  progressive  readjustment  of  ratios  between  the  several 
values.  All  the  doctrines  and  fjolicies  of  the  [)eriod  which 
we  are  considering  have  to  be  interpreted  in  their  connection 
with  the  ruling  presumption  of  the  paramount  imi)()rtance 
of  the  j)rince,  who  may  or  may  not  have  been  differentiated 
in  thought  from  the  government  which  he  rei)resented.  In 
cither  case,  the  ideas  of  prince  and  government  as  values  in 
themselves,  not  as  functionaries  and  functions  to  be  appraised 
according  to  their  service  for  other  values,  were  foremost  and 
decisive  throughout  this  regime.  We  shall  have  occa.sion  to 
ask  more  than  once,  as  wc  proceed.  To  what  extent  had  some 
suggestion  of  another  scale  of  values  begun  to  work  in  the  minds 
of  the  Germans?  It  is  not  a  [)art  of  the  task  set  for  this 
volume  to  demonstrate  the  answer  to  the  question.  We  shall 
be  obliged,  however,  to  point  out  frecjuent  incidental  symptoms 
of  the  workings  of  more  democratic  imi)ressions. 

Rohr  exjiressly  adojils  that  form  of  the  scnial  contract 
theory  which  presupi>oses  nature  pef)ple  contemf)lating  an 
intolerable  .social  (ondilion,  real  or  impending.  To  escape 
or  to  avert  this  condition  the  whole  number  of  individuals 
make  over  their  wills  to  one  or  more  rulers.  Thereafter  the 
will  oi  the  whole  community  can  be  expressed  only  by  this 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ROllR  I9V 

single  or  multiple  ruler,  and  the  subject  has  mj  rij^htful  alicr- 
native  but  obedience.  The  ruler  summarizes  not  only  the 
will  but  the  welfare  of  the  state,  or  of  the  individuals  merj^ccl 
into  a  unique  personality  (pp.  248  ff.).  By  a  chain  of  reason- 
ing which  we  need  not  follow,  Rohr  concludes  further  {p.  258; 
that  a  Christian  monarch  is  bound  by  divine  and  human  law 
to  take  responsibility  for  both  the  temporal  and  the  eternal 
welfare  of  his  subjects.  This  view  of  course  furnisiies  the 
basis  for  explanation  of  the  ecclesiastical  [)olity  of  Lutheran 
states,  and  the  author  shows  decidedly  better  acquaintance 
with  church  problems,  and  es{)ecially  with  minutiae  of  j)arochial 
procedure,  than  with  the  more  strictly  cameralistic  departmonls 
of  f^overnment.  This  leaning  toward  ecclesiasticism  is  shown 
in  a  most  painfully  smug  chapter  on  the  proper  course  of  rulers 
toward  "dreamers,  pietists,  and  new  prophets"  (pp.  322-65). 

It  must  be  admitted,  however,  that  if  Rohr's  ecclesiastical 
views  belong  in  a  world  which  Americans  cannot  understand, 
his  views  of  the  relation  of  the  state  to  education  are  at  bottom 
identical  with  our  own.  So  far  as  there  is  a  difference  in 
principle  it  may  be  traced  to  his  emphasis  on  the  interest  of 
the  state  in  the  training  of  good  citizens,  while  we  are  inclined 
to  view  the  matter  more  from  the  side  of  the  right  of  the  indi- 
vidual to  education.  The  ecclesiastical  factors  in  education 
which  Rohr  had  in  mind  were,  both  in  subject-matter  and  in 
machinery,  accidental  rather  than  essential  variations  of 
educational  principles  which  modern  democracies  attempt  to 
apply  with  other  details. 

In  the  chapter  **7o»  Academien,^'  Rohr  partially  antici- 
7)ates  Justi  in  a  plea  for  ''ein  Professor  Oeconomiae^^  at  the 
universities.  The  chapter  is  entirely  in  accord  with  the  other 
evidence  found  in  the  writers  of  this  group  to  the  effect  that 
their  references  to  ^'oeconomica^^  or  any  equivalent  expression 
connoted  something  very  different  from  the  implications  of 
the  same  terms  in  the  nineteenth  century,  and  particularly 


200  THE  CAMERALISTS 

different  from  English  versions  of  the  terms.  In  the  order  in 
which  the  items  occur  in  the  chapter,  we  may  note,  first,  that 
the  subjects  which  Rohr  wishes  such  a  professor  to  teach  are 
at  once  indicated  by  the  phrase  Stadt-  und  Landes-Wirth- 
scliaft;  second,  the  principal  reason  alleged  for  failure  to 
establish  such  professorships  was  difficulty  of  finding  men  who 
had  university  training  who  at  the  same  time  possessed  either 
knowledge  of  these  subjects  or  fitness  to  teach  them;  third, 
slightly  varying  the  second  point,  scholars  had  seldom  given 
attention  to  Oeconotnie,  while  skilled  managers  {Haushaltungs 
Verstdndige)  had  seldom  done  much  with  ^^studiis"  in  the 
university  sense;  third,  it  ought  not  to  be  difficult  to  find  here 
and  there  men  with  experience  in  administrative  offices  who 
understand  management  {Wirthschaffl)  from  the  bottom  and 
couM  teach  it  passably;  fourth,  in  answer  to  the  claim  that 
Oeconomica,  Politica  und  morale  ought  to  be  taught  by  the 
Professori  moralium,  and  that  accordingly  increase  of  the 
number  of  professorships  is  unnecessary,  Rohr  says  it  is  true 
that  diligent  Professori  moralium  do  not  fail  to  introduce  into 
their  political  courses  all  sorts  of  economic  observations,  but 
it  is  impossible  that  they  could  fully  explain  these  three 
sciences;'  fifth,  quoting  Dohler,'  "In  the  schools  the  prejudiced 
opinion  prevails  that  a  student  should  not  concern  himself 
with  any  sort  of  Hauss-Wesen,  that  it  is  even  a  disgrace  for  a 
student  to  have  anything  to  do  with  such  employments;"  sixth, 
such  being  the  case,  it  is  high  time  that  students  in  schools 
and  colleges  should  learn  Oeconomie  from  artisans  and  even 
from  peasants.  3 

I  At  this  point  appeal  is  made  to  Morhoff,  "in  dem  3.  Buche  des 
III.  Tomi  seines  Polyhistoris;"  and  to  "der  beruhmte  Professor  zu 
Franckfurt,  Johann  Christoph  Beckmann,  in  dem  |io.  des  X.  Capitels 
seiner  Polit.  Parall." 

'"Herrn  Joh.  George  Dohler  in  seiner  UnUrsuchung  des  keut-tu- 
Tage  Uberhand  nehmenden  Geld-  und  N ahrungs-M angels." 

3  The  author  refers  for  further  considerations  on  the  subject  to  the 
first  chapter  of  bis  Haushaltungs-Bibliothek. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ROHR  201 

From  these  citations  it  is  evident  that  by  common  under- 
standing among  friends  and  foes  of  "economic"  instruction, 
the  thing  intended  was  technical,  not  philosophical.  It  was 
even  more  remote  from  subjects  then  regarded  as  within  the 
pale  of  Wissenschaft  than  manual  training  is  today  in  the  minds 
of  those  who  are  least  inclined  to  welcome  it,  or  its  maturer 
continuations,  into  our  lower  and  higher  schools. 

Chap,  xvi,  "  Von  der  Gdehrsamkeit,"  develops  the  theorem: 

Since  good  arts  and  sciences  are  fitted  in  no  slight  degree  to 
increase  and  to. maintain  the  happiness  of  a  land  and  of  its  ruler, 
it  follows  that  a  ruler  who  has  the  weal  of  his  provinces  at  heart  has 
the  best  of  reasons  for  desiring  that  his  subjects  should  be  instructed 
in  all  sorts  of  useful  disciplines.  The  more  learned  and  intelligent 
they  are,  the  more  available  are  they,  whether  in  peace  or  in  war. 

The  discussion  takes  a  turn  which  shows  the  limitations  of 
the  time  with  respect  to  freedom  of  thought;  that  is,  it  dwells 
more  on  what  should  not  be  permitted  in  schools,  or  allowed 
to  appear  in  print,  than  upon  promotion  of  unrestricted  investi- 
gation; but  in  one  direction  it  calls  for  increased  liberality. 
Sec.  12  opens  with  the  remarks: 

In  the  case  of  political  writings,  people  are  in  many  places  far 
too  scrupulous.  State  secrets  are  made  out  of  matters  which  are 
quite  innocent,  and  sometimes  people  fear  to  make  public  anything 
with  reference  to  state  affairs,  although  no  good  reason  for  such 
caution  can  be  found.* 

Beginning  with  chap,  xvii,  "  Von  Lastern,"  the  book  invades 
more  and  more  technical  ground,  but  with  the  equipment  of 
the  essayist  rather  than  of  the  specialist,  and  in  a  style  addressed 
rather  to  the  general  reader  than  to  close  students.  As  a 
mirror  of  the  times,  it  would  be  of  great  value  to  a  culture 
historian  who  knew  how  to  use  such  material.  For  our 
purpose  it  yields  nothing  which  is  not  to  be  found  in  more 
reliable  form  elsewhere. 

I  Obrecht  has  already  furnished  us  a  case  in  point.     Vide  above, 
P-43. 


202  THE  CAMERALISTS 

Two  exceptions  to  the  foregoing  must  be  noted.  The  first 
is  a  negative  contribution  to  our  inquiry.  In  the  twenty-first 
chapter,  on  the  police  system  of  cities,  Rohr  gives  one  of  the 
clearest  testimonies  to  be  found  in  the  cameralistic  or  quasi- 
cameralistic  literature,  that  the  police  system  as  outlined  later 
was  only  in  a  slight  degree  in  existence  at  the  date  of  the  book. 
The  institution  had  yet  to  be  developed  to  meet  needs  that 
were  felt  before  the  means  of  satisfying  them  were  created. 
Rohr  quotes  "a  certain  unnamed  author,  who  has  described 
the  well-organized  state  of  the  hitherto  much-sought  but  never- 
discovered  kingdom  of  Ophir."  He  is  said  to  have  expressed 
himself  as  follows: 

Because  through  observance  of  good  Policey  the  divine  blessing 
and  the  prosperity  of  a  land  are  best  insured,  certain  Policey-Rdlhe 
should  be  appointed.  These  should  be  efficient  and  learned  men  in 
Moralibus,  Politicis  und  Oeconomicis,  and  they  should  be  used  for 
drawing  up  good  police  ordinances,  and  for  zealously  supervising 
their  execution.  Their  oflSce  demands  requirement  that  agricul- 
tural land  should  everywhere  be  well  cultivated  and  sowed  with  the 
necessary  seed,  that  management  [Wirthschaft]  should  be  well  and 
thriftily  [hausslich]  conducted;  impious,  immoral,  vicious,  dissolute, 
and  infamous  persons  should  nowhere  be  tolerated;  that  vagrants 
and  idlers  should  be  made  to  work,  the  roads  and  ways  be  kept  good 
and  secure,  the  streams  be  made  navigable,  cities  and  villages  be 
provided  with  good  inns,  traffic  by  water  and  land  carried  on  fairly 
and  diligently,  children  and  servants  well  trained  and  provided,  the 
offices  properly  filled,  the  unworthy  expelled  from  civic  stations,  law 
and  justice  administered,  the  wicked  punished,  the  pious  rewarded, 
and  the  poor  relieved.  In  short,  that  there  should  everywhere 
prevail  honorable.  Christian  and  righteous  life. 

Rohr  declares,  however,  that  this  ideal  must  be  put  in  the 
class  of  piorum  desideriorum.  He  thinks  that  no  more  odious 
progranmie  could  be  imagined  than  the  prerogatives  proposed. 
His  opinion  is  of  no  value  to  us.  The  important  thing  is  the 
evidence  which  the  passage  furnishes  that  the  Policey  Ordnung 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ROHR  203 

afterward  introduced  was  in  a  very  rudimentary  stage  when  he 
wrote.  His  ideas  of  the  standards  of  conduct  which  ought 
to  be  enforced  by  government  seem  to  conform  in  spirit  to  the 
standard  quoted,  and  he  goes  into  a  mass  of  details,  but  the 
particular  machinery  recommended  by  the  anonymous  author 
alone  meets  his  disapproval.  Rohr  apparently  felt  jealous 
for  the  prerogatives  of  the  church  in  connection  with  these 
matters.  The  progress  of  events  realized  more  of  the  system 
foreshadowed  in  the  quotation  than  its  author  appears  to  have 
expected.  Indeed  more  than  half  of  Rohr's  book  is  occupied 
with  subjects  which  Justi  afterward  systematized  under  the 
rubric  Policey. 

The  second  exception  to  the  general  proposition  that  Rohr 
affords  little  light  on  the  cameralistic  problem  proper  is  found 
in  chap,  xxviii,  on  "The  Riches  of  the  Country."  Recalling 
his  earlier  assertion  that  the  interests  of  the  prince  are  bound 
up  with  those  of  his  subjects,  he  premises  in  particular  that  the 
prince  has  every  reason  to  do  his  best  that  the  subjects  may  be 
rich.  Without  mincing  words,  he  frankly  puts  this  identity 
of  interest  between  prince  and  subjects  in  the  affluence  of  the 
latter  on  the  ground  that  if  the  subjects  have  money  the  sov- 
ereign always  has  means  at  his  command  to  get  it  from  them. 
"On  the  other  hand,  if  the  subjects  are  poor,  he  can  no  more 
get  money  from  them  than  one  can  squeeze  water  out  of  a  dry 
sponge."* 

After  reciting  some  of  the  information  which  a  prince  must 
command,  about  the  wealth  and  sources  of  income  of  his 

I  Rohr  cites  Schroder,  "Furstliche  Schats-  und  Rent-Cammer,  as 
holding  the  opposite  view,  viz.,  "a  prince  who  has  no  money  in  his  chest, 
but  relies  on  the  good  will  of  his  subjects  and  territories,  is  walking  on 
stilts."  Our  review  of  Schroder,  in  which  we  have  quoted  the  same 
words  (above,  p.  144),  shows  that  the  contradiction  was  not  so  direct  as 
Rohr  supposes.  He  had  chiefly  in  mind  one  stage  in  the  process,  while 
Schroder  put  the  emphasis  at  another  point,  relying  however  on  the 
same  ultimate  resource. 


204  THE  CAMERALISTS 

subjects,  that  he  may  know  the  location  and  capacity  of  the 
springs  which  he  must  tap,  Rohr  betrays  his  ideas  of  wealth 
itself,  and  his  expressions  are  rather  remarkable.     He  says: 

A  prince  must  have  care  that  his  land  may  increase  in  riches. 
A  land  becomes  richer,  in  proportion  as  money  and  gold  (sic)  are 
brought  into  it,  either  from  its  own  mines  or  elsewhere,  and  poorer 
as  money  leaves  the  country.  For  inasmuch  as  by  general  consent 
of  peoples  gold  and  silver  are  the  universal  price  of  all  things,  and 
the  worth  of  the  same  in  all  places  in  the  world  is  estimated  according 
to  the  worth  of  gold  and  silver,  for  which  everything  can  be  bought, 
one  must  estimate  the  riches  of  a  land  according  to  the  quantity  of 
the  gold  and  silver  in  the  same.  Hence  a  prince  must  give  his 
thought  to  means  whereby  the  land  may  become  richer,  and  he  must 
remove  everything  through  which  it  becomes  poorer  (p.  844).' 

Rohr  is  not  content  to  let  the  matter  rest  with  one  statement. 
He  repeats  it  in  this  form  in  the  next  paragraph,  almost  in  the 
words  of  Schroder,  as  indeed  the  previous  quotation  was,  viz. : 
We  find  gold  and  silver  in  the  mines,  and  this  is  the  most  certain 
increment  of  the  riches  of  the  country,  for  as  much  as  gold  and  silver 
are  found,  so  much  has  the  country  increased  in  riches. 

'  After  Schroder's  chap,  xxx,  no  equally  clear  expression  of  this 
opinion  is  to  be  found  in  the  cameralistic  writers  previous  to  Rohr.  If 
the  language  is  carefully  considered  it  will  be  seen  that  even  this  brash 
assertion  of  Rohr  cannot  properly  be  construed  as  a  generalization  of 
the  same  logical  order  as  Adam  Smith's  propositions  about  wealth. 
Rohr  was  evidently  not  probing  beyond  immediate  practical  utility. 
He  was  not  seeking  for  a  philosophy  of  wealth,  but  for  a  basis  of  prudence 
in  dealing  with  the  means  necessary  for  practical  wisdom.  It  would 
be  as  preposterous  to  make  such  a  statement,  by  a  writer  of  Rohr's  type, 
the  clue  to  the  economic  basis  of  cameralism,  as  it  would  be  to  take  the 
enthusiastic  declaration  of  some  interested  politician,  in  the  days  of 
Dingley  and  McKinley,  that  a  protective  tariff  is  the  only  way  to  create 
wealth,  as  the  measure  of  the  economic  insight  of  Americans  in  the 
present  generation.  As  we  have  seen,  Rohr  was  not  an  authority  upon 
any  technical  or  philosophical  subject.  He  is  not  to  be  taken  as  repre- 
senting the  cameralists,  except  in  a  relatively  remote  way.  Yet  it  is 
from  such  sources  that  the  extreme  forms  of  statement  came  which  were 
afterward  charged,  under  the  label  "mercantilism,"  to  the  responsible 
publicists  of  Germany  for  most  of  the  rest  of  the  century. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ROHR  205 

Then  follows  an  uncritical  formulation  of  the  theory  of  the 
balance  of  trade.  At  the  same  time,  without  perception  of  its 
bearing  upon  the  idea  of  the  exceptional  character  of  gold  and 
silver  as  riches,  the  fundamental  necessity  of  making  the  country 
as  fertile  as  possible  is  urged  as  strenuously  as  though  the 
author  were  the  extremest  physiocrat. 

In  the  chapter  on  mining  (xxxvi),  Rohr  again  falls  back 
upon  Schroder.^     The  theorem  of  the  latter  is: 

A  prince  should  cause  the  gold  and  silver  mines  to  be  worked, 
if  they  yield  anything  at  all,  whether  with  a  loss  or  a  profit,  for  that 
matters  not  to  the  country,  since  I  have  shown  [chap,  xxx]  that  this 
is  the  most  certain  approach  of  a  country  to  riches.' 

The  most  direct  evidence  which  we  get  of  Rohr's  sources 
in  the  next  chapter,  on  forests,  is  his  citation  of  von  Carlowitz' 
Sylvicultura  Oeconomica,  yet  he  writes  with  great  confidence, 
and  evidently  from  a  larger  range  of  direct  observation  than  in 
any  other  portion  of  the  book,  unless  it  may  be  the  ecclesiastical 
sections.  The  essay  style  and  quality  prevail  in  the  remainder 
of  the  book,  and  it  yields  nothing  farther  that  is  notable  for 
our  purpose. 

»  Particularly  on  p.  278  of  the  first  edition  of  Filrstl.  Schatz-  und 
Rent-Cammer.  In  the  edition  of  1744,  which  I  have  compared,  the 
passage  is  on  p.  181. 

«  In  the  same  connection  Rohr  remarks,  "  Es  ware  zu  wundschen, 
dass  die  Bergwercks-Lehren,  die  der  Herr  Abraham  von  SchSnberg  in 
seiner  Berg-information,  Tit.  von  Berg-Herren,  s.  15,  vortraget,  von  alien 
Potentaten  in  wiirckliche  Observanz  gesetzt  wUrden."  Except  that 
Justi  does  not  find  occasion  to  lay  stress  on  the  first  of  Schonberg's  six 
recommendations,  viz.,  gratitude  to  God,  if  the  country  has  been  blessed 
with  gold  and  silver  deposits,  Justi  developed  his  mining  policy  along 
the  lines  of  this  predecessor.     Vide  below,  pp.  358  ff. 


CHAPTER  IX 

THE  CAMERALISTICS  OF  GASSER 

We  come  now  to  the  point  at  which  cameral  science  was 
first  officially  designated  as  a  subject  to  be  taught  in  universi- 
ties. Whatever  their  scientific  merits  or  defects,  the  men  who 
mark  this  event  in  the  history  of  cameralistics  are  notable.^ 

>  The  most  complete  survey  up  to  date  of  the  academic  phase  of 
cameralism  is  Stieda,  Die  Nationalokonomie  als  UniversittUswissenschaft, 
I^ipzig,  1906.  Within  the  period  covered  by  the  present  study,  the 
cameralism  even  of  the  book-writers  centered  in  the  bureaus  rather  than 
in  the  universities.  The  reverse  became  the  case  in  the  following  period. 
Stieda  (p.  9)  credits  Thomasius  with  having  been  the  first  to  read  a  course 
on  national  economy  in  a  German  university.  Such  judgments  do  not 
impress  me  as  at  all  reliable.  In  the  first  place,  if  we  had  syllabi  of  all 
the  courses  given  at  this  period,  it  would  be  difficult  to  gain  a  consensus 
about  the  way  of  drawing  the  line  between  those  that  should  be  regarded 
as  economic  in  the  general  sense  of  the  time,  and  those  that  should  not. 
In  the  second  place,  judging  from  Thomasius'  notes  on  Osse  (vide  above, 
pp.  24  ff.),  it  seems  to  me  altogether  probable  that  Nicolaus  Hieronymus 
Gundling  (vide  Stintzing,  All.  d.  Bib.,  in  loc),  although  a  pupil  of  Tho- 
masius in  Naturrecht,  may  have  been  earlier  and  quite  as  distinguished 
as  he  in  the  economic  field.  Stieda  does  not  seem  to  have  run  down 
the  facts  in  this  instance  {vide  p.  38).  Again,  it  is  certain  that 
(ierhard  was  lecturing  at  Jena  on  economics,  in  the  contemporary 
sense,  as  early  as  1713  (vide  above,  p.  175).  Gerhard's  name  does  not 
appear  in  Stieda's  index.  As  a  sign  of  the  difficulty  of  obtaining  the 
literature  of  cameralism,  it  is  worth  noting  that,  in  spite  of  his  vantage 
ground  at  Leipzig,  Stieda  says  he  has  been  unable  to  see  a  copy  of  Sin- 
cerus,  Projekt  der  Oeconomie  in  Form  einer  Wissenschaft  nebst  einem 
unmassgeblichen  Bedenken,  wie  diese  Wissenschaft,  beydes  in  Tkeorie 
und  Praxi,  mil  mehrerm  Fleiss  und  Nutzen  getrieben  werden  ktinne, 
Frankfurt  und  Leipzig,  1660;  he  failed  also  to  find  a  copy  of  Zincke, 
Programm  von  practischen  Collegiis  juridico-poliiico-cameralibus,  1741- 
42;  he  appears  to  have  found  in  one  library  only  (Leipziger  Stadtbiblio- 
thek)  the  monograph  of  Justi  (1754),  Auf  hdchsten  BefeM  an  Sr.  Rom. 
Kaiserl.  und  zu  Ungarn  und  Bdhmen  Kdnigl.  Majestiit  erstaltetes  aller- 

206 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  GASSER  207 

According  to  Inama,'  Gasser's  father  was  KurfUrstlich 
hrandenhurgischer  LandrentmeisUr.  The  range  of  ideas  within 
which  the  paternal  duties  were  discharged  must  account  in 
part  for  the  interests  and  limitations  of  the  son.  As  Inama 
further  says,  "he  had  a  clear  but  extremely  jejune  intellect, 
with  total  absence  of  higher  philosophical,  ethical  and  histori- 
cal conceptions."  Gasser  built  upon  Seckendorff,  but  was 
far  from  appreciating  the  whole  range  of  the  earlier  author's 
wisdom.  For  our  purposes,  the  fact  that  Gasser  was  professor 
of  law,  and  also  a  member  of  the  Schbppenstuhl  at  Halle, 
before  he  was  appointed  to  the  newly  created  chair  of  camera- 
listics,  is  all  that  is  necessary  by  way  of  introduction  to  his  book. 

Since  Gasser  was  the  first  to  occupy  the  economic  profes- 
sorship established  at  Halle  (1727),  his  book,  published  two 
years  after  beginning  the  new  duties,  would  deserve  attention 
as  a  waymark,  even  if  it  contained  nothing  otherwise  notable.' 

untertdnigstes  Gutachten  von  dem  vernunftigen  Zusammenhange  und 
praktischen  Vortrage  aller  Oekonomischen  u.  Kameralwissenschaften; 
he  found  no  copy  of  John  Christian  Fcirster,  Einleilung  in  die  Cameral- 
Policey-  und  Finanz-Wissenschaft,  1779  (?);  etc.  .Mthough  I  have 
failed  to  get  access  to  certain  of  the  cameralistic  books,  my  examination 
of  previous  accounts  of  them  leads  me  to  the  belief  that  on  the  whole 
they  have  never  been  subjected  to  a  more  conscientious  examination  than 
in  this  study.  At  least,  I  have  expressed  no  judgment  as  my  own  upon 
books  which  I  have  not  carefully  analyzed.  There  are  good  reasons  for 
doubting  whether  even  Roscher  could  have  said  as  much.  I  venture  to 
hope  that  this  necessarily  incomplete  survey  will  provoke  German  scholars 
to  attempt  a  completely  objective  restoration  of  the  cameralistic  writers. 

>  All.  d.  Bib.,  in  loc. 

» Simon  Peter  Gassers,  JCti,  Einleilung  zu  den  Oeconomiaclten 
Politischen  und  Cameral  Wissenschaften,  Worinnen  filr  dieses  mal  die 
Oeconomico-Cameralia  Von  den  Domainen-  oder  Cammer-  auch  andern 
Giitern,  deren  Administration  und  Anschldgen,  so  wol  des  Ackerbaues  als 
anderer  Pertinentien  halber,  samt  den  Regalien  angeuiget  und  erlautert 
werden.  Nebst  einem  Vorbericht  Von  der  Fiindation  der  neuen  oecono- 
mischen  Profession,  und  der  Aller durchlauchligsten  Sti/iers  eigentlichen 
aller gnddigsten  Absicht,  Halle;  In  Verlegung  dea  Waysenhauses, 
MDCCXXIX   (pp.   347  ff.)- 


2o8  THE  CAMERALISTS 

The  items  in  the  book  which  mean  most  for  our  purpose 
arc  contained  in  the  Preface.  They  may  be  reduced  to  a  very 
brief  resume,  but  the  process  of  extracting  this  tincture  from  the 
fil>rous  rhctr)rical  pulp  which  contains  it  is  extremely  perplexing. 
In  the  dedication  to  Friedrich  Wilhelm  I  prominence  is 
^iven  to  the  statement  that  the  king  had  both  excited  the 
admiration  and  gratified  the  wish  of  many  scholars  by  taking 
the  lead  in  establishing  economic  professorships.  With  respect 
both  to  the  "admiration"  and  the  "many,"  Gasser's  own 
account  shows  that  our  acceptance  of  the  record  must  be  care- 
fully qualified.  All  the  evidence  goes  to  show  that  the  scholars 
in  Germany  who  looked  with  any  favor  whatever  at  this  period 
upon  the  idea  of  introducing  economics  into  the  universities 
were  few  and  far  between.  It  appears  further  that  some  of 
the  credit  for  the  innovation  in  Prussia  is  probably  due  to 
Thomasius,  the  editor  of  Osse's  Testament,  at  that  time  rector 
of  the  University  of  Halle. 

In  explaining  the  king's  objects  in  founding  the  new  "eco- 
nomic professorship,"  Gasser  incidentally  betrays  facts  in  the 
situation  which  are  doubtless  more  apparent  to  the  present 
reader  of  his  book  than  they  were  to  his  own  mind.  He  states, 
first,  that  the  king  wanted  young  men  to  get  in  the  universities 
some  of  the  elementary  knowledge  which  would  make  them 
available  as  civic  employees.  With  the  zeal  of  a  new  convert 
he  contrasts  this  desirable  knowledge  with  the  sort  of  thing 
which  had  up  to  that  time  been  the  nearest  approach  to 
preparation — "juridical  pedantries  and  lawyers'  tricks.'"  He 
rings  many  changes  on  this  charge.  He  thereby  shows, 
first,  that  the  subject  which  he  represented  was  fighting  for 
its  life,  and,  second,  that  men  of  his  type  had  already  formulated 
in  their  own  minds,  if  they  had  not  widely  published,  some 
rather  specific  counts  against  the  scholastic  formalism  of  the 
law  faculties  of  the  period. 

'  "Blosse  Juristerey  oder  woi  gar  Advocaten-Streichen." 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  GASSER  209 

The  next  item  which  we  disentangle  from  the  author's 
labored  and  involved  form  of  explanation  is  that  he  felt  himself 
on  the  defensive  for  delaying  as  long  as  two  years  before  pub- 
lishing this  book  on  the  subject  of  his  professorship!  His 
explanation  is,  in  brief,  that  his  duties  required  him  to  teach 
"from  morning  till  five  or  six  in  the  evening,"^  that  his  official 
duties  "auf  der  Kammer  und  Deputation"  consumed  his 
forenoons,  that  from  six  o'clock  till  late  at  night  he  had 
"enough  duties  connected  with  the  bureau,  the  faculty  and 
other  official  labors  to  occupy  two  or  three  men,"  and  that 
consequently  there  remained  to  him  for  work  on  economic 
subjects  "only  the  few  morning  hours  up  to  eight  o'clock!" 
Furthermore,  he  contemptuously  describes  authorship  in  the 
legal  faculty  as  a  process  of  picking  out  passages  from  ninety- 
nine  volumes  and  scribbling  them  into  a  hundredth.  On  the 
contrary,  "although  a  heap  of  economic  rubbish  has  been 
brought  to  light  already,  there  are  few  if  any  pioneers  in  this 
subject,  but  everything  must  be  collected  with  much  labor 
and  reflection,  also  by  inquiries  and  collation."*  Gasser 
returns  several  times  to  the  additional  difficulty  that  "the 
scholarly  and  efficient  Hauswirthe  and  Politici  are  more  at 
odds  with  one  another  than  any  other  scholars  can  possibly  be."^ 

Retiiming  to  the  reasons  why  economic  professorships  had 
not  been  established  earlier,  Gasser  quotes  Thomasius,*  first, 
on  the  proposition  that  the  jurists  had  become  mere  word- 

1  He  retained  his  legal  professorship,  and  his  economic  teaching 
occupied  only  a  portion  of  his  time. 

*  Inasmuch  as  he  presently  acknowledges  Seckendorff  as  a  pioneer 
to  whom  he  is  greatly  indebted,  it  seems  necessary  to  connect  this  remark 
particularly  with  the  special  sort  of  material  to  which  Gasser' s  book  is 
devoted.  This  conclusion  carries  with  it  a  judgment  as  to  the  sense  in 
which  Gasser  used  all  variations  of  the  term  oeconomisch. 

3  For  Justi's  comments  on  the  situation  at  this  period,  vide 
bek>w,  pp.  396  fF. 

4Cautele  der  Rechts-Celahrtheit,  cap.  17,  (i. 


2IO  THE  CAMERALISTS 

splitters  and  no  longer  edifying  instructors  of  candidates  for 
civic  positions;  second,  that  Oeconomie  ought  to  be  taught  in 
the  universities  by  professors  especially  charged  with  that 
subject;  and  third,  on  the  reasons  for  omission  to  supply  this 
need.  Thomasius  covers  all  the  points  on  which  we  have 
already  quoted  Rohr  in  this  connection,^  and  he  adds  the 
following    reasons: 

First,  because  Aristotle  left  us  no  economic  books,  and  at  the 
founding  of  the  first  universities  the  monks  knew  nothing  but  Aris- 
totle; second,  the  belief  has  prevailed  that  the  scholar  should  concern 
himself  with  something  different  from  that  which  the  drudge  and 
common  man  understands;  third,  it  has  possibly  been  partly  from 
fear  that  the  laity  would  discover  the  tricks  of  clerical  Oeconomie; 
fourth,  scholars  of  the  traditional  sorts  have  little  fitness  to  investi- 
gate economic  subjects,  and  so  make  light  of  them ;  fifth,  the  same, 
and  indeed  all  scholars,  are  apt  to  be  poor  economists  in  their  own 
private  affairs;  sixth,  good  economy  would  not  tolerate  monkish 
laziness,  but  is  based  on  the  contrary  belief  that  "man  is  destined 
for  labor,  and  that  he  who  does  not  work  is  not  worthy  to  eat."' 

'  Vide  p.  200  above. 

» In  further  explanation  of  the  royal  purpose  in  establishing  the 
professorship  at  Halle  to  improve  the  situation  thus  indicated,  Gasser 
inserts  abstracts  from  the  official  correspondence  leading  to  his  appoint- 
ment. The  most  significant  expressions  are  these:  "Es  haben  Seine 
Konigliche  Majest.  in  Preussen  ....  resolviret  auf  beyden  Universi- 
tiitcn,  Halle  und  Franckfurth,  Professores  Oeconomiae  bestellen  zu  lassen, 
welche  denen  Studiosis  die  principia  der  Land-Wirthschaft,  wie  auch 
der  Policey,  ingleichen  die  Einrichtung  der  Anschlage  von  Aemtern 
und  Giitern,  nicht  weniger  guter  Verfass-  und  Regulirung  der  Stadte 
beybringen  soUen."  Further,  in  the  final  rescript:  "  Friederich  Wilhelm, 
Kunig,  Demnach  Wie  aus  hochst  eigener  Bewegung  allergnadigst  resol- 
viret, dass  auf  der  dortigen  Universitat  die  cameralia  oeconomica  und 
PoHcey-Sachen  gleichergestalt,  wie  die  Ubrige  Studia  und  Wissenschaften, 
docirct  werden  sollen,  ....  damit  die  studirende  Jugend  in  Zeiten,  und 
ehe  sic  zu  Bedienungen  employret  werden,  einen  guten  Grund  in  obge- 

dachten  Wissenschaften  erlangen  mogen,   etc.,   etc Berlin  den 

24.  Julii  1727."  Gasser  also  refers  to  a  monograph  by  the  pro- rector 
of  the  University  of  Halle,  von  Ludewig.     Vide  below,  p.  216. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  GASSER  211 

The  sense  in  which  the  king  understood  the  term  Oeconomie, 
and  in  which  Gasser  undertook  to  use  it,  appears  in  part,  though 
by  no  means  fully,  in  the  further  explanation  by  the  author: 

His  majesty  manifested  in  the  beginning  great  displeasure  at 
the  bad  Oeconomie  which  young  people  were  in  the  habit  of  practicing 
in  their  own  affairs,  so  that  when  they  come  back  from  universities 
and  tours,  they  are  usually  already  so  loaded  with  debts  that  they 
are  helpless,  and  especially  those  who  have  landed  estates  carry  on 
such  thriftless  management  because  of  aforesaid  debts,  that  they 
cannot  rescue  even  the  most  important  estates  from  embarrass- 
ment when  they  at  last  gradually  get  some  insight  into  Oeconomie, 
especially  because  the  people  who  operate  and  superintend  the  estates 
can  defraud  the  uninstructed  owners  in  countless  ways. 

This  being  the  state  of  things,  continues  Gasser,  his  majesty 
was  zealous  to  change  the  proportion  of  lawyers,  who  filled  the 
country  and  sucked  it  dry.  He  wanted  young  men  to  learn  not 
merely  the  elements  of  jurisprudence,  but  to  add  the  elements  of 
poliiica,  oeconomica  and  cameralia  (p.  8). 

Gasser  explains  that  in  order  to  meet  this  demand,  he 
devotes  the  first  half-year  to  lectures  on  Seckendorff's  Fiirsten- 
Staai.  He  says  that  although  this  schones  TractdUein  does 
not  contain  much  about  Oeconomica  proper,  yet  it  in  general 
corresponds  with  the  royal  intention  in  surveying  the  whole 
state,  and  thus  in  furnishing  a  basis  for  setting  the  lawyers 
right.  Gasser  also  mentions  Rohr's  book  as  a  compendium 
oeconomicum,  but  he  does  not  agree  with  the  author  that  it 
would  form  a  useful  basis  for  university  lectures,  because  it 
contains  too  much  that  is  specific  and  practical  in  form,  but 
not  available  until  it  can  be  reconsidered  and  applied  after 
adoption  of  fundamental  rules.  "Besides,"  adds  Gasser, 
"there  is  nothing  in  the  book  in  the  way  of  correct  formulation 
of  the  budgets." 

This  latter  remark  is  explained  by  a  glance  at  Gasser's 
categories  of  AnschlUge  for  all  sorts  of  minor  industrial  opera- 
tions.   This  estimate  of  the  unavailability  of  Rohr  is  apparently 


212  THE  CAMERALISTS 

to  be  understood  primarily  by  comparison  with  Seckendorflf, 
because  Gasser  shows  that  he  is  interested  in  quite  as  minute 
details  as  those  presented  by  Rohr.  He  finds  in  Seckendorff, 
however,  the  necessary  statement  of  fundamental  principles 
upon  which  specific  rules  of  management  must  rest. 

After  elaborating  this  claim  at  some  length,  Gasser  cites 
"von  Schroter,"^  on  the  difference  between  a  rich  man  and  a 
rich  prince;  to  the  effect  that  "much  money  makes  a  rich  man 
but  not  a  powerful  prince."  Gasser  interprets  Schroder  as 
meaning  not  that  a  prince  should  have  no  money,  but  that  he 
should  have  both  money  and  power.  Consequently,  Gasser 
urges  that  the  two  supporting  pillars  of  the  princely  state  are 
"revenues  from  the  country  and  well-to-do  subjects  in  the 
country,  particularly  in  the  towns."  This  theorem  is  the  text 
for  a  somewhat  detailed  argument  upon  the  importance  of 
promoting  diversified  industries. 

The  author's  Vorhericht  closes  with  a  promise  to  make 
his  lectures  as  valuable  commentaries  as  possible,  both  by 
explanation  and  illustration,  upon  the  contents  of  the  book. 
Although  it  is  aside  from  our  main  purpose,  we  may  quote 
the  paragraph  in  which  a  pedagogical  turn  is  given  to  this 
promise,'  viz.: 

I  proix>se  also  to  set  apart  a  designated  hour  on  Saturdays  in 
which  the  work  of  those  who  commendably  choose  to  attempt  prac- 
tice at  once  will  be  examined,  their  mistakes  pointed  out  and  further 
guidance  given.  For  that  purpose  I  shall  assign  to  some  the  tasks 
of  drawing  up  the  budgets  [Anschldge]  of  estates,  and  of  formulating 
the  spedal  budgets  of  breweries,  milb,  brickyards,  etc.,  belonging 
to  estates.  Others  will  be  required  to  draw  up  the  customs  schedules, 
catastra,  etc.,  on  the  lines  indicated  in  the  several  chapters.  When 
these  are  read  and  discussed  on  Saturdays,  other  students  will  be 
appointed  as  revisers  and  examiners,  while  the  lectures  will  take 

I  FUrst.  Schatt-  und  RerU-Cammer.     Vide  above,  p.  153. 
*  Vide  Justi's  related  remarks,  below,  p.  303  S, 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  GASSER  213 

them  up  further,  and  they  will  thus  be  considered  as  it  were  in  full 
session.  In  a  word,  each  student  will  be  encouraged  to  do  his  best 
in  the  line  in  which  he  shows  most  inclination,  while  by  listening  to 
the  work  of  all  he  may  gain  a  general  idea  of  the  whole  subject. 

The  body  of  the  book  is,  in  a  very  narrow  sense,  technical. 
As  evidence  of  the  progress  of  administrative  technology  it 
would  call  for  careful  comparison  with  previous  and  following 
handbooks.  For  our  purpose  its  chief  significance  is  negative. 
That  is,  it  shows  that  the  horizon  of  cameralistic  theory,  as 
the  author  understood  it,  was  bounded  by  the  rules  of  thrifty 
management,  first  of  the  domains  of  the  prince,  and  then  of 
the  various  gainful  employments,  sometimes  viewed  as  lucra- 
tive for  the  individual  citizens,  and  sometimes  as  having  their 
chief  importance  as  ultimate  revenue  creators  for  the  prince. 

Even  this  modicum  of  meaning  is  to  be  found  in  the  book 
only  after  patient  consideration.  The  of)ening  chapters,  first, 
on  the  meaning  of  domains  in  general,  and  especially  on  the 
invalid  distinction  between  Domainen-GiUer,  Tqffel-GiUer,  and 
Cammer-GUter,  and  second,  on  incorporation  of  new  acquisi- 
tions into  the  domains,  have  only  the  remotest  visible  connection 
with  all  that  follows.  They  have  every  appearance  of  having 
been  revamped  from  the  author's  old  law  lectures,  and  forced 
into  service  in  place  of  a  general  survey,  which  he  could  not 
extemporize.  They  are  an  unkempt  rabble  of  juridical  archae- 
ology, homespun  philology,  current  legal  usage,  and  common- 
sense  conclusion.  To  the  modem  reader,  they  are  mostly 
unintelligible.  From  the  references  to  Seckendorff  one  derives 
the  impression  that,  beyond  these  incongruities,  all  the  definite 
instruction  which  the  author  imparted,  after  this  impotent 
preamble,  was  drawn  from  the  FiirstenStaat.  One  other 
obvious  inference  is  that  the  author  regarded  the  word-splitting' 
which  he  summed  up  in  these  two  chapters  as  a  bad  inheritance 
from  the  civilists  and  the  canonists.  While  he  was  not  sufficiently 
emancipated  from  the  futile  controversy  to  ignore  it,  his  opinion 


214  THE  CAMERALISTS 

was  as  frank  in  substance  as  it  was  Hibernian  in  form,  viz., 
"If  the  French  writers  had  not  broken  the  ice  of  the  theorems 
of  the  spiritual  and  secular  state,  the  papal  and  glossarial  yeast 
would  have  got  the  upper  hand!"  (p.  3). 

Without  making  any  visible  use  of  these  two  chapters  on 
the  domains,  the  author  plunges,  without  a  word  to  account 
for  the  abrupt  change,  into  a  series  of  chapters  on  the  most 
minute  details  of  private  thrift. 

Chaps,  iii-x  inclusive  begin  with  analysis  of  ordinary  build- 
ing processes,  and  end  with  details  of  assessment  of  tithes  and 
other  tributes.  Sixty-two  pages  are  assigned  to  itemized 
schedules  of  the  cost  of  different  sorts  of  construction,  e.  g., 
a  tile  roof;  a  thatch  roof;  the  carpenter's  work  on  a  country 
house;  estimate  for  a  pigeon-cote  resting  on  posts;  estimate 
of  the  cost  of  mason  work;  cost  of  wheelwright's  work;  cost 
of  pottery,  etc.,  etc.  The  logic  which  calls  for  these  exhibits 
begins  with  the  major  premise:  "To  avoid  being  cheated,  you 
must  know  customary  prices." 

Details  of  a  corresponding  order  constitute  the  substance 
of  the  chapters  just  referred  to.  The  aim  in  the  author's  mind 
is  made  plain  again  by  the  opening  sentences  of  chap,  iv, 
"On  the  budgets  of  estates  in  general,  and  particularly  of  agri- 
cultural lands  in  three  classes,  and  how  such  budget  is  to  be 
constructed,  according  to  the  amount  of  seed  furnished  or 
otherwise."    Thus: 

As  Columella  observed  of  his  own  time,  that  all  sciences,  such 
as  military  service,  scholarship,  commerce,  building,  nautical  art, 
even  music,  dancing,  and  such  things,  have  their  own  guides  and 
teachers,  yet  agriculture  has  neither  pupils  nor  teachers.  The  same 
holds  of  our  time.  It  consequently  comes  about  that  the  minority 
take  occasion  to  think  for  themselves,  but  whoever  lives  in  the  coun- 
try, or  has  an  estate  of  his  own,  follows  the  custom  of  the  majority, 
and  what  is  still  wiser,  if  a  specially  good  manager  is  in  the  locality, 
the  rest  observe  and  try  to  imitate  him. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  GASSER  215 

The  passage  goes  on  to  say  that  doing  the  same  thing  which 
the  good  manager  does  may  not  really  be  doing  the  same  thing; 
because  there  is  a  failure  to  note  the  di£ferent  circumstances 
of  adjacent  tracts,  and  to  conform  treatment  to  the  varying 
conditions.  Thereupon  follows  an  attempt  to  analyze  classes 
of  soil  and  to  show  the  processes  of  culture  appropriate  to  each. 
The  following  one  hundred  and  forty  pages  contain  abundant 
evidence  that  technical  and  social  administration  of  rural  com- 
munities was  at  this  time  a  highly  developed  and  convention- 
alized art,  but  at  the  same  time  it  was  an  art  consisting  of 
aggregated  rule-of-thumb  practice.  It  had  no  secure  basis 
in  fundamental  principles. 

The  chief  difference  between  the  j&rst  ten  and  the  remaining 
twelve  chapters  of  the  book  is  not  in  the  method  of  treatment 
but  rather  in  the  fact  that  the  former  deal  with  technique  of 
more  strictly  private  management,  while  the  latter  belong  to 
a  larger  degree  in  the  realm  of  public  management.  In  either 
case  the  author's  effort  is  to  describe  actual  administrative 
practice.  He  has  before  his  mind  the  private  or  public  func- 
tionary, and  he  tries  to  schedule  the  kinds  of  information  which 
proprietors  or  managers  of  farms,  or  civic  functionaries  of 
various  grades,  from  bureau  clerks  up  to  the  prince,  would 
have  occasion  to  use  in  their  respective  positions.  All  this 
was  Oeconomie,  as  Gasser  interpreted  the  term.  It  had  the 
same  relation  to  pure  economics,  as  we  understand  the  term 
today,  which  instruction  in  the  technique  of  operating  a  gas 
plant  or  an  electric  street-railway  or  a  telephone  exchange 
would  have  to  foundations  of  economic  theory. 

In  order  to  get  at  the  full  significance  of  the  cameralistic 
foundations  at  Halle  and  Franckfurt  a.  O.*  the  writings  of 
Thomasius  would  have  to  be  more  carefully  examined.  As 
our  space  forbids  this,  we  may  merely  call  attention  in  pass- 
ing to  another  important  factor  in  the  movement,  Ludewig, 

*  Vide  below  on  Dithmar,  pp.  222  ff. 


2l6  THE  CAMERALISTS 

professor  of  law  and  chancellor  of  the  University  of 
HaUe. 

On  the  occasion  of  the  establishment  of  the  new  professor- 
ship Ludewig  wrote  a  quaint  little  book  of  i66  pages,  explain- 
ing and  praising  the  king's  purpose.  The  tract  is  a  document 
of  firstrate  importance  as  evidence  sustaining  our  main  thesis 
about  the  center  of  interest  in  the  whole  cameralistic  period.^ 
Indeed,  excess  of  c)micism  could  not  justly  be  charged  if  one 
should  conclude  that  for  reasons  of  his  own  the  writer  had 
seized  the  opportunity  rather  for  laudation  of  the  regime  of 
Friedrich  Wilhehn  I  than  to  promote  cameralistic  science.  At 
all  events,  the  monograph  is  vivid  confirmation  of  our  diagnosis 
of  cameralism  as  fiscalism.' 

The  essay  seems  to  ignore  the  promise  of  the  title-page 
until  forty-five  of  its  fifty-six  sections  (one  hundred  and  thirty 
out  of  one  hundred  and  sixty-six  pages)  are  completed.  The 
argument  begins  with  citation  of  the  alleged  dictum  of  the 
Persian  King  Cyrus,  "A  select  army  and  good  management 
{ Wirthschafft]  of  the  subjects^  are  the  two  chief  and  surest  means 
of  making  a  people  rich  and  a  land  permanently  happy."  The 
authority  of  Socrates,  reinforced  by  Xenophon,  is  inserted 
along  with  that  of  Cyrus,  "although  they  wej^e  heathen  who 

'  Vide  above,  p.  6. 

»  Die,  von  Sr.  Koniglichen  Majestdt,  unserm  allergnddigsten  Konige, 
auf  Dero  Universitdt  Halle,  am  14  Juli  1 727,  Neu  angerichtete  Profession, 
in  Oeconomie,  Policey,  und  Cammer-Sachen  wird,  nebst  VorsUUung 
einiger  Stiicke  verbesserter  Kdn.  Preussl.  Policey,  bekannt  gemachet  von 
dem  zeitigem  Prorectore,  Joh.  Peter  von  Ludewig,  Id.  Universitdts-Cantt- 
lern 1727- 

i  It  is  impossible  to  decide  from  the  context  whether  Ludewig  clearly 
chose  between  the  subjective  and  the  objective  force  of  his  genitive:  i.  e., 
whether  his  thought  was  "on  the  part  of  the  subjects"  or  "over  the 
subjects."  From  the  succeeding  discussion  it  appears  that  the  two 
aspects  of  the  case  were  hardly  differentiated  in  his  mind,  although  the 
emphasis  falls  heavily  on  management  by  the  ruler. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  GASSER  217 

must  somehow  have  obtained  divine  enlightenment,"  to  sus- 
tain this  argument.  Then  follows,  largely  as  an  interpretation 
of  Columella,  a  justification  of  the  dictum,  chiefly  on  its  eco- 
nomic side,  from  the  experience  of  the  Romans,  including  the 
Eastern  emperors.  As  a  transition  to  the  immediate  applica- 
tion of  the  theme,  Ludewig  remarks  (§9)  that  it  is  very  difficult 
to  find  in  ancient  or  modem  history  a  ruler  who  is  equally 
great  in  war  and  in  promotion  of  management  (Wirtschaft) . 
Possibly  Henry  IV  of  France  is  one  of  the  few  exceptions. 
After  reciting  at  some  length  illustrations  of  that  monarch's 
wisdom  and  prudence,  Ludewig  continues: 

But  why  should  we  pause  so  long  upon  a  foreign  and  past  exam 
pie?  Through  a  brave  and  wise  king,  God  has  placed  this  truth 
before  the  eyes  of  our  own  times  and  subjects  (sic).  Wherefore  we 
could  and  should  daily  admire,  honor  and  thank  the  perfect  [grund- 
gUten]  God,  for  such  a  blessed  government  of  his  anointed.  So  long 
as  the  worid  has  stood,  as  may  easily  be  proved  from  the  authentic 
history  of  all  realms,  no  region  of  the  earth  has  seen  an  army  to  be 
compared  with  that  of  Prussia,  etc.,  etc.  (§10). 

Having  continued  this  eulogy  in  some  detail,  Ludewig 
specifies  and  partially  describes  in  turn,  as  items  in  the  excel- 
lence of  the  Prussian  system: 

the  administration  of  charity  (§14);  the  workhouses  and  penal 
institutions  (§15);  the  homes  for  veterans  (§16);  medical  and  sani- 
tary institutions  (§17);  colonies  (§18);  the  establishment  of  many 
industries,  and  regulation  of  the  same  (§§19-24);  settlement  of 
boundary  disputes  (§25);  redemption  of  waste  lands  (§26);  con- 
struction of  water-ways  (§27);  development  of  salt  works  (§28); 
profitable  farming  of  certain  royal  prerogatives  (§29);  selection  of 
capable  young  men  as  subordinates  in  administrative  offices  (§30) ; 
written  ordinances  and  laws  for  all  functionaries  (§31);  revision  and 
promulgation  of  the  code  of  private  law(§32) ;  standardizing  of  weights 
and  measures  (^33) ;  transformation  of  feudal  tenures  into  complete 
property  (§34);  introduction  of  money  commutation  for  cavalry 
service  (§35);  removal  of  capitation,  property  and  other  taxes  (§36); 


2i8  THE  CAMERALISTS 

reforms  of  the  currency  (§37);  establishment  of  the  office  of  comp- 
troller (§38);  careful  signing  of  royal  decrees  (§39);  administration 
of  justice  and  expediting  of  legal  processes  (§40) ;  consequent  improve- 
ment of  the  royal  finances  (§41);  simplification  of  ceremonial  (§42). 

Without  notice  of  transition  from  eulogy  to  exhortation, 
LudeMrig  ventures  to  offer  three  cautious  suggestions,  viz.: 

That  it  would  be  well  for  the  government  to  provide  adminis- 
trative, and  especially  the  Policey,  bureaus  with  national  and  special 
maps  and  diagrams  visualizing  the  conditions  of  the  country  at  large, 
and,  in  more  detail,  of  the  respective  administrative  divisions  (§43); 
that  certain  feudal  burdens  should  be  removed  (§44);  that  the  mili- 
tary and  fiscal  administration  should  in  certain  features  be  reor- 
ganized (§45)- 

After  this  introduction,  which  occupies  more  than  three 
times  the  space  reserved  for  the  ostensible  purpose  of  the 
discourse,  Ludewig  turns  to  the  supposed  theme  of  the  mono- 
graph in  this  way: 

But  this  should  be  enough  about  the  details  of  good  Oeconomie 
and  Policey,  which  by  divine  grace  and  blessing  are  daily  before  our 
eyes  in  these  lands.  And  as  we  have  rendered  ourselves  liable  to 
all  sorts  of  perverse  judgments  about  this  writing,  which  flowed  so 
easily  from  our  pen  and  good  heart,  we  will  now  set  forth  the  motives 
for  the  same,  instead  of  offering  excuses.  For  since  his  royal  majesty, 
our  most  gracious  king  and  lord,  in  founding  at  Halle  a  new  profes- 
sorship of  Oeconomie,  Policey  und  Cammersachen,  was,  so  far  as  I 
know,  the  first  in  the  learned  world  to  take  such  a  step;  and  since 
he  most  graciously  decreed  that  the  intention  and  use  of  the  same 
should  be  made  public;  I  have  l^elieved  that  neither  the  new  Oecono- 
mic-Professor  could  receive  a  greater  impulse  to  his  labor  nor  the 
students  and  apprentices  [Lehrlinge]  greater  zeal  for  such  courses, 
than  if  they  should  turn  their  thoughts  especially  in  aforesaid  Came- 
ral,  Policey  und  Oeconomie-Lehren,  to  the  example  of  the  great  and 
wise  founder,  in  his  kingdom,  provinces,  and  lands;  if  they  should 
enlarg>:  upon  what  I  have  said,  and  correct  that  in  which  I  have  been 
in  error,  and  especially  if  they  should  add  the  larger  part  which  I 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  GASSER  219 

have  been  obliged  to  leave  untouched.  Besides  this,  I  must  call  to 
mind  that,  along  with  my  administrative  duties,  the  founder  of  our 
Friedrichs-UniversitiU  conferred  upon  me,  along  with  the  professor- 
ship of  history,  the  calling  of  a  royal  historiographer,  in  which 
capacity  I  felt  a  strong  impulse  to  use  the  present  occasion  for  a  contri- 
bution to  einer  Oeconomie-  und  Policey-Historie.  And  as  a  matter 
of  fact  great  lords  may-well  be  pitied  for  the  money  and  appointments 
which  they  bestow  upon  historiographos.  The  latter  either  use 
their  salary  for  their  own  enjoyment  in  learned  idleness,  or,  if  they 

do  any  work,  fall  upon  obsolete  times  and  forget  their  founder 

This  may  be  partly,  indeed,  because  the  archives  are  closed  to  them. 
....  Another  extenuating  item  is  that  if  the  historian  happens  to 
make  a  mistake  about  current  affairs,  certain  people  at  once  seize 
the  opportunity  to  discredit  him  at  court.  Moreover,  if  anything 
is  written  about  recent  times,  it  is  mostly  about  wars  and  rumors  of 
wars,  and  the  great  deeds  at  home  \zu  Hauss  und  im  Lande]  are 
seldom  mentioned.  Finally,  it  is  urged  by  the  unintelligent  that 
there  is  no  use  in  writing  down  what  is  known  to  everybody  in  the 
land.  These  do  not  consider  that  subsequent  times  consume  and 
erase  the  preceding,  and  that  what  is  now  before  our  eyes  and  in 
our  hands  fifty  years  hence  will  have  become  a  secret  and  forgotten, 
if  not  made  a  part  of  history.  Such  being  the  case,  great  lords  are 
unfortunate  to  labor  only  to  be  forgotten,  and  the  praiseworthy, 
wise  and  tireless  princes  who  have  done  so  much  good  for  their  lands 
and  peoples,  and  have  left  to  good  successors  so  many  examples, 

have  no  advantages  over  worthless  rulers (Sec.  46  elaborates 

still  further  the  theme,  "Make  the  history  of  good  princes  while 
they  are  living.") 

Sec.  47  goes  somewhat  more  into  detail  about  the  develop- 
ments that  led  to  the  new  professorship,  but  in  substance  it 
repeats  Gasser's  account  above  (p.  208),  Sec.  48  discusses 
the  relation  of  the  new  professorship  to  the  chairs  of  "practical 
philosophy,"  "ethics,"  and  " politics."  Incidentally  this  section 
exhibits  in  the  most  explicit  way  the  content  of  the  term 
Oeconomie,  as  officially  sanctioned  in  Prussia  in  1727.  Expand- 
ing the  proposition  that,  while   Oeconomie   at   last   belongs 


220  THE  CAMERALISTS 

within  the  departments  named,  yet  it  requires  special  attention 
as  a  subject  by  itself,  Ludewig  sa3rs: 

It  is  easy  to  guess  the  secret  why  hitherto  professors  have  taught 
Oeconomie  who  were  in  doubt  whether  to  look  for  ears  of  com  on 
trees  or  in  the  ground.  For  the  sponsor*  to  whom  they  refer  deals 
in  his  economic  books  almost  wholly  with  the  morality  of  father, 
mother,  children,  and  servants.  As  to  arable  land,  meadows,  streams, 
forests,  gardens,  plants;  how  to  treat  cattle  in  the  stall;  how  to 
increase  the  supply  of  manures;  how  to  brew  grain  and  to  sell  the 
product;  what  a  manager  has  to  do  and  what  to  leave  undone  every 
day  in  the  year;  what  provisions  he  must  keep  in  store  for  fire-pro- 
tection, for  food,  in  storehouse,  in  kitchen,  and  in  cellar:  of  all  these 
things  Aristotle  has  not  a  syllable.  Hence  his  creatures,  the  Oecono- 
mie Professores,  up  to  the  present  time,  have  not  concerned  themselves 
with  these  things,  but  they  have  considered  themselves  masters  when 
they  could  explain  the  "commandments"  which  the  children  recite. 
This  is  the  reason  why  among  the  hundred  philosophical  books  which 
treat  of  Oeconomia  there  is  not  a  wholesome  and  practical  line,  and 
thus  this  name  conceals  the  greatest  fraud. 

With  this  indirect  definition  of  the  scope  of  the  new  pro- 
fessorship we  have  the  substance  of  the  essay,  so  far  as  our 
purpose  is  concerned.  In  writers  to  be  noticed  presently  we 
shall  find  intentional  or  unintentional  echoes  of  these  reflections 
upon  belated  Aristotelianism.  The  points  to  be  noted  particu- 
larly are,  first,  that  the  concept  carried  by  variations  of  the 
term  Oeconomica  at  that  time  did  not  by  any  means  make  it 
identical  with  the  scope  of  contemporary  Cameralwissenschaft; 
second,  that  the  term  was  equally  contrasted  with  the  nineteenth- 
century  term  economics  and  its  variations;  third,  that  the 
foundation  of  the  Prussian  professorships  of  Oeconomica,  etc., 
was  of  less  immediate  significance,  either  for  cameral  science 
in  general  or  for  economic  science  as  we  now  understand  the 
term,  than  was  assumed  by  the  men  directly  interested,  and 
even  by  later  writers.  The  horizon  of  economics  in  a  compre- 
<  Aristotle.  rfr?^ 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  GASSER  221 

hensive  sense  dawned  on  the  view  of  the  Germans  in  a  way 
somewhat  parallel  with  that  by  which  the  sociological  outlook 
in  our  time  has  widened  from  attention  to  certain  remedial 
problems  to  survey  of  the  entire  social  process.^ 

«  In  the  two  following  sections  (49,  50)  Ludewig  discusses  the  need 
of  more  exact  terms,  and  especially  the  possible  substitution  of  the  term 
Wirthschaft  or  HaushaUerschaft  for  Oeconomie.  The  remainder  of  the 
essay  repays  careful  analysis  as  an  index  of  the  author's  knowledge  about 
the  bibliography  of  the  subject.  He  de[>ends  chiefly  upon  Seckendorff 
and  Rohr,  both  for  general  conceptions  of  the  sciences  with  which  the 
new  professorship  is  to  deal  and  for  clues  to  other  writers.  He  is  suffi- 
ciently explicit  that  the  men  who  understand  Wirthschaft,  as  distinguished 
from  the  commentators  upon  Aristotle,  have  ignored  controversies  about 
mere  words  and  names,  and  have  written  some  good  books  about  all 
kinds  of  practical  management. 


CHAPTER  X 
THE  CAMERALISTICS  OF  DITHMAR 

Justus  Christoph  Dithmar  was  bom  March  13,  1677,  and 
died  on  the  anniversary  of  his  birth  in  1 737.  We  need  to  know 
of  his  personality  simply  that  he  was  professor  of  history,  then 
of  Natur-  und  Volkerrecht,  at  Frankfurt  a.  O.,  and  was  desig- 
nated to  the  chair  at  Frankfurt  corresponding  to  that  of  Gasser, 
practically  at  the  same  time  with  the  appointment  of  the  latter. 
Both  began  their  new  duties  October,  1727.     Roscher  remarks: 

While  Gasser  took  his  point  of  departure  from  jurisprudence, 
Dithmar  passed  from  history  to  cameral  science.  It  may  be  due 
to  this  circumstance  that  he  (Dithmar)  is  as  far  behind  his  colleague 
in  practical  economic  insight  as  he  is  superior  to  him  in  general 
culture*  (p.  431). 

The  two  books  which  bear  their  names  being  taken  as  the 
sole  basis  of  comparison,  Roscher  is  justified  in  his  estimate 
of  the  relative  merits  of  Gasser  and  Dithmar.  Roscher  is 
clearly  in  error,  however,  both  when  he  says  that  the  division 
into  "Oeconomie,  Polizei-  und  Cameralwissenschaft"  originates 
with  Dithmar,  and  when  he  credits  him  with  the  distinction 
between  the  *'land-  und  stadtwirthschaftliche  Zweige  der  Volks- 
wirthscha/t."  Both  divisions  are  discoverable  in  Gasser.' 
The  latter  is  plainly  formulated  by  Rohr.3  It  is  true  that 
Dithmar  is  the  first  to  use  these  distinctions  as  titles  for  sub- 
division of  a  cameralistic  syllabus. •♦    Inama  seems  to  have 

«  This  is  merely  Roscher's  surmise.  I  have  ventured  (below,  p.  229) 
to  locate  the  differences  between  them  a  little  farther  bark. 

»  The  former  is  implied,  not  quite  precisely,  in  the  title-page;  the 
latter  is  in  chap,  ii,  in  the  subdivision  of  rural  and  town  economy 
in  building. 

3  Vide  al)ove,  p.  188. 

4  All.  d.  Bib.,  in  loc. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  DITHMAR  223 

repeated  Roscher  on  these  points,  without  examining  the 
evidence.  Neither  seems  to  have  noticed  that  Stisser  confi- 
dently attributes  to  P.  Fischer  the  distinction  between  Land 
and  Stadt  Wirthschaft.^ 

Although  Gasser  and  Dithmar  began  the  work  of  their 
cameralistic  professorships  simultaneously,  the  latter  does  not 
find  it  necessary  to  imitate  the  former  in  an  apology  for  delay 
in  publishing  on  this  subject.  The  book  which  appeared 
four  years  after  he  assumed  his  new  duties  is  a  mere  skeleton 
of  academic  lectures."  In  the  Preface  he  gives  virtually  the 
same  account  of  the  king's  purpose  in  establishing  the  pro- 
fessorship which  we  have  already  drawn  from  Gasser  and 
Ludewig  with  reference  to  Halle.  Dithmar  speaks  in  much 
more  terse  and  confident  terms.  He  takes  it  for  granted  that 
since  "the  welfare,  power,  and  repute  of  a  state  rest  on  a  well- 
ordered  economic,  police,  and  cameral  system,"  and  since 
people  versed  in  statecraft  have  long  wished  that  studious 

»  Einleitung,  x.  Abth.,  §10.     Vide  below,  pp.  238  £f. 

«  Hn.  Just.  Christoph  Dithmars,  des  Natur  und  Vdlkerrechts,  wie 
auch  der  GeschichU  und  dconomischen  Wissenschaften  vormahligen  offent- 
lichen  Lehrers  und  der  kdnigl.  preussischen  Acadetnie  der  Wissenschaften 
zu  Berlin  Mitgleides,  Einleitung  in  die  dconomischen,  Policey-  und  cameral- 
Wissenschaften.  Nebst  Verzeichniss  eines  zu  solchen  Wissenschaften 
dienlichen  Biichervorrathes  und  ausfUhrlichem  Register.  Mit  neuen 
Anmerkungen  um  Gebrauch   dconomischer   Vorlesungen  vermehret  und 

verbessert  von  D.  Daniel  Gottfried  Schreber.      FUnfte  Ausgabe 

1755.  With  bibliography  and  index,  pp.  328.  According  to  Inama 
{pp.  cit.)  editions  of  this  book  were  published  in  1731,  1740,  1745,  1748, 
1755,  and  1768.  The  author's'  preface  to  the  first  edition  was  dated 
"16.  Nov.  1731."  I  have  used  only  this  fifth  edition,  whose  preface  is 
dated  Halle,  September  24,  1755.  Of  Schreber,  the  editor,  Roscher 
says:  " .  .  .  .  the  Leipzig  Professor  of  Oeconomie,  Poliui-  und  Cameral- 
wissenschaft  (1708-77),  whose  botanical  knowledge  was  valued  by  Lin- 
naeus, and  who  showed  historical  sense  in  his  chief  work:  Abhandlung 
von  Gammer  giUern  und  EinkUnflen,  der  en  Verpachtung  und  Adminis- 
tration (1743.  II-  Aufl.,  1754)-" 


224  THE  CAMERALISTS 

youth  might  be  introduced  to  these  subjects  before  entering 
the  employment  of  the  state,  the  king's  action  in  providing 
such  instruction  settles  the  matter,  so  far  as  the  academic 
rights  of  the  professorship  are  concerned. 

It  is  more  notable  that  Dithmar  says,  "since  no  introduction 
to  such  sciences  existed."  This  is  a  significant  reflection  upon 
Gasser,  not  to  mention  the  earlier  writers  whom  we  have  noticed. 
It  goes  far  as  a  sign  that  Dithmar  perceived  the  provincialism 
of  previous  writers,  and  had  a  broader  conception  than  they 
had  shown  of  the  necessary  scope  of  cameralistic  theory.  He 
confesses  that  his  Part  IV  on  Policey-Wissenschaft  takes  the 
police  ordinances  of  Prussia  as  the  material  to  be  explained, 
with  certain  notable  features  of  the  civil  law  of  other  states. 

Schreber's  Preface  to  the  fifth  edition  is  in  some  respects 
more  instructive  for  our  purposes  than  the  book  itself.  The 
editor  says  that  he  has  been  careful  merely  to  correct  the  text 
and  to  insert  such  brief  notes  as  would  menace  neither  the  size 
of  the  book  nor  the  publisher's  price.  He  used  Dithmar's 
book  as  the  basis  of  his  own  lectures,  probably  first  at  Halle, 
later  at  Butzow,  then  at  Leipzig  {vide  Stieda,  p.  38).  His 
estimate  of  the  book  is  expressed  in  the  judgment: 

To  the  sainted  author  belongs  this  honor,  viz.:  Of  the  study 
which  he  undertook  to  teach,  the  mistaken  opinion  prevailed,  that 
it  could  not  be  compressed  into  certain  fundamental  theorems,  and 
could  not  be  taught  in  universities;  yet  he  was  a  path-breaker  in  the 
subject,  and  he  showed,  not  only  that  both  things  were  possible, 
but  that  they  were  useful.  In  spite  of  its  faults,  his  introduction 
retains  the  value  of  the  most  convenient  reading  book  on  the  sciences 
of  which  it  treats,  and  is  used  in  various,  including  Catholic 
universities. 

Schreber  continues: 

I  do  not  deny  that  since  the  book  first  saw  the  light  we  have  had 
more  profound  and  elaborate  introductions  to  the  cameral  sciences. 
....  I  know  the  writings  of  a  Gasser,  Zschackwitz,  Stisser,  Hof- 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  DITHMAR  225 

mann,'  Justi,  and  others,  and  I  would  not  detract  in  the  least  from 
the  credit  due  either  to  them  or  to  the  eminent  merits  of  Herm  Hof- 
raths  Zink  (sic),  who  was  the  first  to  go  deepest  into  these  sciences, 
when  I  nevertheless  declare  Dithmar's  Einleitung  the  most  available 
of  all  for  the  purposes  of  academic  lectures. 

Schreber  states  that  the  day  before  writing  the  Preface  he 
had  for  the  third  time  completed  in  a  half-year  the  course  in 
which  he  used  Dithmar's  Einleitung  as  a  syllabus,  and  he  had 
found  no  other  book  with  which  he  could  cover  the  ground  in 
the  same  time.  The  technical  aims  of  his  instruction  appear 
in  his  explanation  of  his  pedagogical  method.  He  kept  in 
mind  the  training  of  clerks  for  bureaus.'  He  closes  with  the 
advice:  "To  those  who  desire  detailed  instruction  in  Kauf- 
mannswissenschaft,   either   Lau's   Entwurf  wohleingerichteter 

>  Of  G.  A.  Hoffman,  Roscher  says  (p.  436):  "His  Klugheit 
Haus  zu  halten  oder  Prudentia  oeconomica  vulgaris  (IV,  1730-49) 
purports  to  treat  systematically  all  Wirthschajlslehre.  It  pays  attention 
more,  however,  to  the  physico-chemical  than  to  the  p>olice  aspects."  I 
have  not  seen  this  work,  and  it  does  not  seem  possible  that  Schreber 
could  have  seen  the  first  edition  of  Justi's  Staatswirthschajt,  which  was 
published  the  same  year  this  preface  was  written.  Of  Stisser  I  shall 
speak  below  (pp.  238  ff.).  I  do  not  think  it  probable  that  Schreber 
referred  to  Johann  Adolph  Hoffman,  whose  book,  Politische  Anmerkungen 
aber  die  wahre  und  falsche  Staatskunst,  was  published  in  Latin  in  1718, 
and  a  German  version  by  the  author  in  1725.  {Vide  Roscher, 
p.  380.) 

'  After  explaining  that  he  put  before  his  students  all  the  writers 
on  the  subjects  in  question,  he  adds:  "  Sodann  lege  ich  bey  denen  Theilen 
wo  practische  Ausarbeitungen  zur  Erlauterung  nothig  sind,  nach  vor- 
ausgeschickten  Grundsatzen,  meinen  Zuhorern  theils  selbst  entworfene 
Muster,  theils  Ausziige  aus  ergangenen  cameral-Acten,  Amtsbiicher, 
Manuale  und  Rechnungen,  Anschlage,  Steuercatastra,  Cammer-Etats, 
tabellarische  Stadt-  und  Landbeschreibungen,  Commercientabellen, 
Kaufmannsbiicher  und  dergleichen  Schemata  vor  die  Augen,  wobey 
sie  zugleich,  wie  Tabellen  ordentlich  zu  verfertigen  sind,  angefiihret 
werden,  wovon  ich  den  Nutzen  bey  meinen  ehemaligen  Expeditionen 
einzusehen  Gelegenheit  genug  gehabt,  etc." 


226  THE  CAMERALISTS 

Negotien,  or  another  system,  about  to  appear  in  print,  is  recom- 
mended."' 

Of  the  syllabus  itself  little  can  be  said  without  going  into 
the  technical  details  by  means  of  which  comparisons  might 
be  possible  with  those  presented  by  earlier  and  later  writers. 
Such  comparisons  are  excluded  from  our  plan.  In  general 
it  may  be  noted  that  Dithmar  furnishes  abundant  evidence 
that  analysis  of  the  relations  concerned  was  becoming  both 
more  objective  and  more  systematic.  The  scientific  plane 
which  author  and  editor  had  reached  may  be  indicated  by  a 
few  citations. 

The  first  section  proposes  the  following  definition: 

Economic  science  {die  Oeconomische  Wissenschajt,  oder  Hauss- 
nvirlhschajts-  und  HausshcUtungskunst)  teaches  how,  through  proper 
rural  and  city  occupations,  support  and  riches  may  be  gained  for 
the  promotion  of  temporal  happiness. 

The  editor  adds  the  following  leading  propositions: 

Economic  science  is  not  an  art.' 

The  purpose  of  this  science  does  not  end  with  attaining,  but 
extends  to  preserving  and  applying,  temporal  income. 

The  difTercnce  between  general  and  special  Oecanomie  must  here 
liC  shown. 

It  should  be  observed  that  the  definition,  and  apparently 
the  editor's  comments,  put  the  subject  of  Oeconomie  quite 
distinctly  on  the  side  of  private  interests.  The  public  aspects 
of  Oeconomie  appeared  to  Dithmar  rather  under  the  other 
two  divisions  of  his  subject. 

After  admitting  that  opinions  differ  greatly  about  Poltcey- 
Tvissenschaft,  Dithmar  expresses  his  own  view  in  this  form. 

It  teaches  how  the  internal  and  external  nature  [fV^wgn]  of  a 
state  is  to  Ije  maintained,  with  a  view  to  general  happiness  [allge- 

'  The  reference  may  have  been  to  Darjes,  or  Justi. 

»  But  the  suffix  Kunst  was  used  with  great  freedom  not  only  by 
Dithmar  in  the  formula  above  quoted  but  by  a  long  line  of  successors. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  DITHMAR  227 

meinc  ClUckseligkeit],  in  good  condition  and  order,  and  accordingly 
that  the  supreme  magistracy  of  the  country  must  have  a  care  that 
their  subjects  shall  not  only  be  kept  in  good  numbers,  God-fearing, 
Christian,  honorable,  and  healthy  life  and  conduct,  and  that  their 
support  and  surplus  of  temporal  goods  shall  be  promoted  by  flour- 
ishing rural  and  town  occupations;  but  also  that  a  land  shall  be 
improved  with  well-laid-out  cities,  country  districts  and  towns,  and 
all  kept  in  good  condition.  Hence  Policeywissenschajt  is  a  part  of 
Slaalsklugheit,  but  it  can  be  taught  conveniently  with  the  economic 
and  cameral  sciences,  on  account  of  its  close  connections  with  both 
(§§viii,  ix). 

Dithmar's  definition  of  Cameralwissenschaft  runs: 
It  teaches  how  the  princely  domain  and  regalian  rights  [Rcgalien] 
may  be  well  used,  and  from  them,  as  well  as  from  the  payments 
[Prastarionen]  due  from  subjects,  and  other  public  funds,  the  princely 
revenues  may  be  raised,  improved,  and  applied  for  the  maintenance 
of  the  community  [getneines  Wesen]. 

The  editor  adds: 

The  difference  between  Finanz-  and  Renlwissenscliajl  must  here 
be  explained  (§x). 

Dithmar  accounts  for  the  neglect  of  these  three  important 
sciences  in  very  nearly  the  same  terms  used  by  Gasser  and 
Rohr,^  especially  in  the  counts  referring  to  Aristotle  and  the 
monks,  to  the  class  pride  which  had  relegated  knowledge  of 
Hausshaltungswesen  to  the  vulgar  herd,  and  he  repeats  the 
arguments  that  all  three  of  these  sciences  consist  of  details 
which  must  be  learned  by  practice,  or  by  association  with  experts. 
Dithmar  contends  stoutly  that  the  principles  of  these  sciences 
may  be  taught  to  advantage  in  the  universities,  while  he  recom- 
mends observation  of  actual  practice  in  the  fields  which  they 
severally  occupy  (§xvi). 

Having  compressed  his  main  propositions  on  these  general 
relations  into  the  brief  space  of  twenty-four  pages,  Dithmar 

*  Vide  above,  pp.  209  ff. 


228  THE  CAMERALISTS 

proceeds  with  the  subject  of  Landbconomie.  His  emphasis 
is  less  on  the  side  of  manual  operation  than  Gasser's,  and 
more  on  managerial  technique.  In  his  way,  he  restricts 
himself  as  closely  to  technical  details  as  his  predecessor.  This 
remark  applies  also  to  Part  IH,  "Fon  der  Stadtoconomie." 
This  WissenscJtaft  is  said  to  teach  "how,  through  the  occupa- 
tions of  citizens,  sustenance  and  riches  may  be  gained  for  the 
ha[)|)iness  of  each  and  of  the  whole."  It  would  be  easy  to 
|)oint  out  curious  combinations  between  the  "science"  so 
marked  off  and  the  Policeywissenschaft  of  the  same  system, 
but  it  is  enough  to  remark  that  these  pioneers  were  not  yet 
much  troubled  about  consistency  of  classification.  They  were 
chiefly  concerned  with  concrete  particulars.  Dithmar  defines 
cities  as  "those  societies  which  have  Stadt-  und  Biirgerrecht, 
and  are  authorized  to  carry  on  city  occupations  [Stadtgewerbe] 
or  pursuits  that  furnish  support  for  citizens"  [hurgerliche 
Nahrungen]  (§  i).  The  analysis  deals  consequently  with  the 
actual  situations  only,  without  attempting  anything  more 
fundamental  than  description  of  existing  urban  arrangements. 
In  the  introduction  to  Part  IV,  on  Policeywissenschcfl, 
Dithmar  says: 

The  Policey  is  grounded  in  civic  society,  in  consequence  of  which 
it  is  competent  for  the  ruling  prince  to  control  the  conduct  and  affairs 
of  his  subjects,  for  the  maintenance  of  the  community  [gemeinen 
Wesens]  (§v). 

He  continues: 

Policey  may  rightly  be  called  the  life  and  soul  of  a  state,  and  the 
importance  of  Policeywissenschajl  is  therewith  evident.  The  more 
the  grievance  that  the  same  has  been  neglected !  In  the  Middle  Ages 
the  Romish  clergy  were  at  fault  for  this.  For  their  purposes  good 
Policey  was  not  desirable,  and  consequently  Policeywissenschaft 
was  suppressed  by  them  along  with  other  disciplines  (§vi).  In  modem 
times  there  is  no  lack  of  political  books,  but  little  about  Policey- 
wissenschajl is  to  be  found  in  them,  without  doubt  because  economic 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  DITHMAR  229 

and  camera!  sciences  are  lacking,  with  which  Policeywissensdmjt 
is  closely  connected  (§vii).  Such  science  is  to  be  gained  by  knowledge 
of  the  police  systems  of  ancient  and  modem  states;  by  meditation 
upon  what  might  be  good  for  a  state  in  view  of  its  circumstances; 
by  associating  with  experts  in  police  affairs;  and  by  personal  experi- 
ence (§§viii,  ix). 

Instead  of  attempting  to  pass  upon  the  value  of  Dithmar's 
specific  views  in  this  connection,  we  shall  allow  Justi  to  stand 
for  this  part  of  the  cameralistic  system.^ 

Dithmar  again  indicates  his  conception  of  Cameralwissen- 
schaft'  in  the  proposition  (p.  242) : 

It  teaches  how  the  revenues  of  the  reigning  prince  may  be  raised, 
from  time  to  time  augmented,  and  so  applied  to  maintenance  of 
the  communitylgemeinen  Wesens]th2it  a  surplus  may  remain  annually. 

As  a  mere  outline  of  the  subjects  which  belong  under  this 
head,  the  syllabus  puts  its  author  in  wholly  respectable  com- 
parison with  Justi.  Of  course  it  is  impossible  to  compare 
his  knowledge  of  details  with  that  of  the  later  writer.^ 

On  the  whole  Dithmar  must  be  regarded  as  in  certain  very 
important  respects  more  t)rpical  than  Justi  of  German  camera- 
listic scholarship  at  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century.  He 
represents  both  its  weakness  and  its  strength.  The  stage  of 
evolution  through  which  this  division  of  German  social  science 
was  passing  may  be  characterized  as  a  struggle  for  emancipa- 
tion from  a-priori,  deductive  methodology,  into  the  freedom 

»  Vide  below,  pp.  436  ff. 

*  In  a  note  Dithmar  gives  the  earliest  explanation  of  the  origin  of 
the  term  which  I  have  found  in  the  textbooks,  viz.,  "The  science  has  its 
names  from  the  word  Camera,  by  which,  according  to  the  idiom  of  the 
Middle  Ages,  the  place  was  designated  in  which  the  revenues  of  the  reign- 
ing prince  were  guarded."  He  refers  to  "du  Fresne,  glos.  v.  camera." 
Vide  Zincke,  below,  pp.  232  ff. 

3  On  the  use  of  Dithmar's  book  as  a  text  by  Ickstatt,  at  Ingolstadt, 
1746,  vide  Stieda,  op.  cit.,  p.  241;  also  by  Thorn  in  Giessen,  i7S7>  ibid., 
P-  153- 


230  THE  CAMERALISTS 

of  empirical,  telic  discovery.  Dithmar  was  evidently  much 
more  conscientious  in  every  way  than  Justi.  He  was  extremely 
respectful  toward  the  past.  He  was  cautious  about  encoura- 
ging innovations.  He  was  the  first  of  the  cameralists  to  present 
a  respectably  classified  bibliography  of  the  subjects  which 
they  treat ;^  and  the  groups  of  writers  scheduled,  ranging 
from  Xenophon,  Geoponica,  Cato,  Varro,  Vergil,  and  a  score 
of  other  writers  on  agriculture,  to  his  immediate  contemporaries, 
on  subjects  which  were  creating  a  new  literature,  vividly  reflect 
the  unconscious  adjustment  that  was  going  forward  between 
authority  on  the  one  hand  and  observation  and  analysis  on 
the  other.  Dithmar  has  fortified  the  text  of  his  little  book 
with  more  references  to  sources  than  are  to  be  found  in  all  Justi's 
writings.  Still  further,  there  is  a  perceptible  contrast  between 
his  mental  attitude  and  that  of  the  legalistic  publicists  who 
had  no  way  of  determining  how  to  drain  a  swamp  or  work 
a  vein  of  ore,  unless  a  precedent  could  be  found  in  the  law 
books.  On  the  other  hand,  Dithmar  was  no  such  man  of  the 
world  as  Justi.  He  could  draw  upon  no  such  varied  experience 
with  affairs.  His  judgments  were  those  of  a  scholar  rather 
than  of  a  business  man.  He  was  therefore  relatively  modest 
and  c(»nventional,  though  evidently  intelligent  and  progressive; 
while  Justi  was  forceful  and  self-assertive,  partly  for  the 
reason  that  he  had  a  much  more  restricted  historical  and 
literary  outlook  than  Dithmar.  The  bolder  and  more  aggres- 
sive type  better  visualized  the  active  factors  which  were  expand- 
ing administrative  theory.  The  less  demonstrative  type  more 
fairly  represented  the  form  in  which  the  reconstruction  was 
im|)rcssing  itself  upon  the  universities.' 

"  I  say  this  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  there  had  been  many  confused 
lists  of  books. 

*  A  final  estimate  of  Dithmar  would  have  to  consider  his  work  as 
editor  and  largely  as  author  of  the  ten  numbers  of  Oekonomische  Fama, 
the  first  German  cameralistic  journal,  1739.     As  I  have  seen  none  of 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  DITHMAR  231 

these  numbers,  I  must  be  content  to  refer  to  Rosther's  account  of  them 
(pp.  431,  432).  In  this  connection  mention  must  be  made  of  several 
men  of  whose  relative  merits  as  camcralistic  writers  I  am  not  prepared 
to  judge.  These  are,  first,  Johann  Hermann  Fijrstcnau,  1688-1756, 
"intrusted  with  the  professorship  Oeconomiae  at  the  University  of  Rinteln 
{Griindliche  Anleitung  zu  der  Haushaltungskunst  und  denen  gehorigen 
furnehmsten  Schriften,  Lemgo,  1736);  second,  Andreas  Berch,  17 11-74, 
who  was  not  in  Germany,  to  be  sure,  but  was  professor  of  Oeconomie  at 
Up>sala  (an  anonymous  monograph,  1746,  on  Die  Art  durch  die  polilische 
Arithmetik  die  Haushaltung  der  Lander  und  Reiche  zu  erforschen,  and, 
in  1747,  Einleitung  zur  allgemeinen  Haushaltung,  Grundsdtze  der  Policey- 
Oekonomie-  und  Kameralwissenschaft,  the  latter  translated  into  German, 
1763,  by  the  writer  about  to  be  named) ;  third,  Daniel  Gottfried  Schreber, 
1709-77,  "the  first  to  hold  a  professorship  of  the  economic  sciences  at 
Leipzig"  {Abhandlung  von  Kammergiitern  und  Einkiinften,  der  en  Ver- 
pachtung  und  Administration,  1743,  II.  Aufl.,  1754;  Zwo  Schriften  von 
der  Geschichte  und  Notkwendigkeit  der  Kameralwissenschaften  insofern 
sie  als  Universitdlswissenschaft  anxusehen  sind:  Entwurf  von  einer  zum 
Nutzen  eines  Staats  zu  errichtenden  Akademie  der  okonomischen  Wissen- 
schaften,  1763).  I  have  been  able  to  see  none  of  the  writings  of  these 
men.  Stieda  {vide  Index)  adds  important  information,  particularly 
about  Schreber. 


CHAPTER  XI 
THE  CAMERALISTICS  OF  ZINCKE 

No  author,  in  the  whole  series  which  this  study  includes, 
is  more  difficult  to  interpret  and  appraise  than  Zincke.  The 
most  obvious  reasons  for  this  are,  first,  that  he  was  a  somewhat 
voluminous  writer,  even  if  we  take  into  account  his  camera- 
listic  publications  alone.  Moreover,  his  books  do  much  less 
than  is  usually  the  case  to  throw  light  upon  one  another.  On 
the  contrary,  his  variations  of  terminology  and  classification 
from  book  to  book  are  bewildering.  It  is  hard  to  decide 
whether  there  is  consistency  and  unity  in  the  successive  volumes, 
or  whether  they  are  so  many  distinct  trials  at  a  baffling  task. 
In  the  second  place,  although  Zincke  presents  his  material 
in  highly  analyzed  form,  his  style  is  elusive,  and  his  divisions, 
subdivisions,  and  cross-classifications  mystify  more  than  they 
elucidate. 

It  is  also  to  be  said  that  Roscher  has  conspicuously  failed 
to  place  Zincke  in  his  true  perspective.  While  it  is  necessary 
to  use  Roscher  in  getting  back  to  the  facts  about  the  cameralists, 
he  is  in  this  case  a  stumbling-block  as  well  as  a  stepping-stone. 

From  the  sketch  by  Zimmermann,'  the  most  salient  points 
in  Zincke's  checkered  career  may  be  summarized  as  follows: 

Georg  Heinrich  Zincke  was  bom  in  1692,  and  died  in  1768. 
His  father  was  a  preacher,  and  both  father  and  mother  seem  to  have 
done  their  best  to  induce  the  son  to  adopt  the  father's  calling.  The 
boy  twice  interrupted  his  school  career  to  enter  the  army.  After 
he  had  become  UnUrofficier  he  was  captured  and  taken  to  France 
as  prisoner  of  war  (1709),  but  escaped,  and  went  to  Jena,  ostensibly 
to  study  theology,  but  he  gave  quite  as  much  attention  to  the  legal 
sciences.  He  was  made  Master  in  1713,  and  was  allowed  to  lecture 
"on  German  and  I^tin  style,  morals  and  GdehrtengeschichU." 

'  AU.  d.  Bib.,  in  loc. 

333 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ZINCKE  233 

After  a  short  engagement  as  Hofmeister  in  a  family,  of  slight  impor- 
tance, he  went  to  Erfurt,  and  acquired  the  right  to  offer  courses  and 
to  preach.  Presently,  "because  of  love  for  the  law,  and  a  throat 
trouble,"  he  went  to  Halle,  where  he  both  lectured  on  his  old  sub- 
jects and  attended  courses  in  the  legal  sciences  by  Ludewig,  Bohmer, 
Thomasius,  etc.  In  1720  he  received  the  degree  Dr.  juris  at  Erfurt. 
Returning  to  Halle,  he  was  in  turn  ''Ordentlicher  Advocat;  Secretar 
und  Syndicus  bei  den  Coloniegerichten  der  Pfalzer  daselbst,  und  bei 
Comtnissionen  in  Cammersachen  beschaftigt;"  later,  ^'Fiscal  der 
Kriegs-  und  Domdnenkammer  im  Saalkreise  und  im  Mansfeldischen, 
dann  wirklicher  Commissionsrath  und  Criminalrath."  The  latter 
position  he  retained  till  1731,  when  he  was  called  to  Weimar  with 
the  rank  of  Hofrath.  He  gained  unusual  favor  with  the  Herzog, 
and  exerted  influence  much  beyond  his  proper  sphere.  Whether 
this  actually  injured  the  Herzog  and  the  country,  Zimmermann 
declines  to  judge.  At  all  events,  Zincke  made  such  enemies  that  a 
judicial  investigation  followed,  with  the  result  that  Zincke  was 
imprisoned  for  three  years.*  Ill,  and  weakened  by  prison  life,  he 
was  taken  up  by  Herzog  Christian  in  Saalfeld,  and  after  his  health 
was  restored  he  was  on  his  way  to  take  a  teacher's  position  in  St. 
Petersburg  when  he  was  persuaded  to  change  his  plan  and  to  remain 
in  Leipzig,  offering  courses  in  the  Rechts-  und  Catneralwissenschajten 
(1740).  Thereupon  Zincke  developed  very  influential  literary 
activities.  His  AUgemeines  okonomishes  Lexicon  (1742)  was  re- 
edited  in  a  fifth  edition  by  Volkmann  (1780),  a  sixth  by  Leich 
(1800),  and  Roscher  speaks  of  a  seventh  in  1820.  The  scientific 
reputation  which  he  gained  thereby  is  said  by  Zimmermann  to 
have  been  the  occasion  of  his  removal  to  Braunschweig  at  the  end 
of  1745,  to  accept  an  appointment  as  Hof-  und  Kammerrath  und 
ordenllicher  Professor  der  Rechte  und  Catneralwissenschajten  am  Col- 
legium Carolinum,  and  soon  as  Mitcurator  of  that  institution.  In 
Braunschweig  Zincke  did  not  acquire  great  influence.  He  was 
charged  with  certain  functions  in  the  administrative  bureaus,  and 
he  lectured  on  Cameral-  und  Policeywissenschaft.  The  control  of 
the  academic  administration  was  entirely  in  the  hands  of  the  "Abt" 
Jerusalem.  Zincke  published  a  criticism  of  the  management  in 
'  Roscher  has  it  "nearly  six  years"  (p.  433). 


234  THE  CAMERALISTS 

1748,  but  Jerusalem  replied  and  was  sustained  by  the  highest  author- 
ity. Zincke  appears,  in  consequence  of  this  rebuff,  to  have  aban- 
doned further  administrative  ambitions.  For  at  least  another  decade, 
or  till  his  sixty-seventh  year,  he  continued  to  be  productive  as  an 
author. 

It  is  difficult  to  fix  upon  an  order  of  treatment  which  will 
most  clearly  represent  Zincke's  contributions  to  cameralistic 
literature.  To  what  has  already  been  said  about  Roscher's 
work  at  this  point,  we  must  add  that  he  really  dodges  the 
"Zincke  problem."*  He  quotes  only  the  earliest  and  least 
mature  of  Zincke's  cameralistic  books;'  his  reference  to  the 
most  pretentious  of  his  books  is  inaccurate,  and  provokes  the 
suspicion  that  he  knew  it  only  through  a  catalogue. 3 

We  must  remark,  second,  that  Roscher's  account  of  Zincke 
is  virtually  a  description  only  of  the  journal  which  he  edited.* 
This  emphasis  deprives  Zincke  of  his  full  due.  At  the  same 
time  it  calls  attention  to  an  important  factor  in  the  development 
of  cameralistic  theory.  Possibly  Zincke's  influence  as  editor 
may  have  been  more  effective  than  the  rest  of  his  literary  labors. 
However  that  may  be,  his  part  in  the  development  of  camera- 
listics  would  be  very  inadequately  represented  if  we  should 
accept  Roscher's  showing  as  sufficient.    His  account  should 

I  Roscher,  pp.  433  ff. 

>  Crundriss  einer  Einleitung  su  der  CameralvHssenschaft,  II  Theile, 
X74a. 

3  AnfangsgrAnde.  Vide  below,  pp.  256  fiF.  The  mere  publishers' 
description,  "II,  1755,"  while  technically  correct,  would  hardly  have 
been  allowed  to  stand  as  a  sufficient  index  of  the  proportions  of  the  work, 
if  it  had  been  carefully  examined.  It  is  nominally  in  two  parts,  but  each 
part  consists  of  two  considerable  volumes.  The  four  volumes  contain 
respectively  pp.  806,  1318,  998,  and  662 -H  Index  62. 

*  Leiptiger  Sammlungen  von  wirihschaftlichen,  Policey-  Cammer- 
und  Finant-Sachen,  of  which  184  numbers  appeared,  1742-67.  As  I 
have  seen  none  of  these  numbers,  I  am  obliged  to  depend  upon  Roscher's 
testimony  with  regard  to  them. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ZINCKE  235 

be  read  by  every  student  of  the  period.^  Letting  that 
contribution  to  the  subject  count  for  what  it  is  worth,  we  must 
introduce  further  evidence  which  at  least  widens  the  basis  of 
judgment. 

Stieda  has  presented  a  much  more  sympathetic  view  of 
Zincke  in  a  compact  sketch.  A  free  rendering  of  the  passage 
will  furnish  a  proper  introduction  to  the  later  books.' 

In  spite  of  the  fact  that  he  did  not  reach  his  aim,  for  he  was  never 
Professor  der  Oeconomie,  although  he  read  lectures  on  this  subject 
at  the  University  of  Leipzig  from  1740  to  1745,  Georg  Heinrich 
Zincke  nevetheless  belongs  in  this  connection.  His  views  must  have 
had  considerable  influence  upon  the  further  development  of  the 
Wirtschajtswissenschaften  as  subject-matter  for  lectures  in  univer- 
sities. In  the  year  1741  or  1742  he  published  a  Programm  von 
practischen  Collegiis  juridico-politico-cameralibus,  the  purpose  of 
which  was  to  recommend  the  lectures  which  he  proposed  to  give. 
Since  these  four  sheets  met  with  approval  he  followed  them  up,  in 
the  year  1742,  with  a  Grundriss  einer  Einleitung  zu  den  Cameral- 
Wissenschajten.  It  consisted  of  two  parts.  A  preliminary  discus- 
sion dealt  with  the  question  how  young  men  should  be  instructed 
theoretically  in  these  sciences,  and  how  they  might  be  introduced 
to  the  application  of  them.  Zincke  had  at  first  the  intention  of  using 
Dithmar's  Einleitung  as  his  text,  and  after  the  death  of  the  latter 
negotiations  were  begun  with  Zincke,  looking  to  his  undertaking, 
as  editor,  to  bring  out  a  revised  edition.  For  unknown  reasons  the 
plan  failed.  Zincke  had  come  to  the  conclusion  that  there  were  serious 
gaps  in  Dithmar's  Einleitung:  e.  g.,  that  it  omitted  too  many  neces- 
sary subjects,  that  it  afforded  insufficient  explanations  to  give  thor- 
ough knowledge,  etc.  Probably  the  author  himself,  if  he  had  lived 
longer,  would  have  improved  the  book  in  these  respects.  At  all 
events  these  imperfections  made  Zincke  feel  the  need  of  publishing 
an  outline  of  his  own. 

» Op.  cit.,  pp.  433-41. 

'  Stieda,  op.  cit.,  pp.  35  £f.  I  cite  this  passage,  first,  because  I  have 
been  unable  to  obtain  the  two  sources  to  which  it  refers;  and,  second, 
because  it  coincides  with  the  judgment  of  Zincke  which  I  had  formed 
from  study  of  his  more  mature  works. 


236  THE  CAMERALISTS 

There  are  but  very  few,  declared  Zincke,  who  at  the  present  time 
devote  themselves  with  special  diligence  and  with  persistent  effort 
to  the  economic  sciences.  Most  people  regard  their  elementary 
principles  as  merely  minor  considerations.  This  being  the  case, 
there  should  be  a  use  for  the  outline.  Its  aim  is  the  common  weal 
[das  gemeine  Beste],  not  the  advantage  of  each  individual  manager. 
All  the  doctrines  which  it  presents  are  connected  with  the  Policei 
or  with  the  public  arrangements  for  support  [Nahrungseinrichiungen] 
in  a  country.  In  Kameralvnssenschaft  the  special  relation  and 
purpose  of  all  these  doctrines  appears  in  their  application  to  the 
management  [Wirtschajt]  of  the  state  and  of  the  prince.  The  total 
Polizeiwissenschajt  as  a  system  of  management  is,  however,  arranged 
really  with  reference  to  the  public  and  general  weal. 

It  was  Zincke's  intention  to  present  these  sciences  in  the  uni- 
versities after  the  following  manner.  In  the  first  place  he  would  offer 
every  half-year  a  general  fandamental  course  on  the  entire  science, 
and  second  on  special  portions.  Third,  he  wanted  to  supply  guid- 
ance in  the  application  of  the  science,  i.  e.,  a  practical  course.  In 
the  latter  it  would  naturally  be  impossible  to  impart  to  the  future 
official  all  the  technique  of  economic  transactions.  Excursions  in 
actual  application  could  be  made,  however,  and  the  students  could 
be  incited  to  prepare  documentary  exercises  in  economic  and  Policei 
procedure.  Zincke  had  the  plan  of  proposing  a  subject,  of  having 
the  same  worked  up,  part  by  part,  through  assignments  to  individuals, 
and  then  of  having  it  presented  and  discussed  by  the  students  as  a 
group.  In  other  words,  these  details  shoW  that  Zincke  was  planning 
essentially  the  seminar  method,  and  he  hoped  thereby  to  make  the 
new  subjects  particularly  attractive.  He  probably  leaned  upon 
Gross,  Entwurj  cines  mil  leickten  Kosten  zu  errichtenden  Seminarii 
ofconomico-politici. ' 

In  the  year  1746  Zincke  accepted  a  call  as  professor  and  Kurator 
of  the  newly  opened  Kollegium  Karolinum  in  Braunschweig.  With 
his  entrance  into  the  service  of  Braunschweig-LtJiK^rg  he  gave  up 
the  realization  of  the  plans  contained  in  the  above-mentioned  pro- 
gramme. Yet  he  considered  his  ideas  so  important  that  he  hoped 
they  would  be  generally  adopted.    Hence  in  1746  he  returned  to  them 

'  Vide  Stieda,  op.  cit.,  p.  13. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ZINCKE  237 

in  the  Leipziger  Sammlungen,  which  he  had  begun  to  publish  in 
1742,  He  put  them  in  more  general  form  as  Gedanken  und  Vor- 
schldge  von  einem  auf  UniversitcUen  auf  die  Cameralwissenschajten 
einzurichtenden   besonderen   CoUegio   Statuum   Europae   Camerali. 

In  this  discussion  he  begins  with  the  explanation  of  a  Politicus. 
He  goes  back  to  a  concept  with  which  we  have  become  acquainted 
in  connection  with  Christian  Weise.'  He  would  not  have  the  word 
understood  to  mean  a  crafty  man  acting  a  p)art  to  the  hurt  of  his 
neighbor,  but  rather  a  man  who  possesses  the  talent,  not  only  in  his 
private  station,  but  also  with  respect  to  the  common  weal,  to  live 
justly  and  wisely.  A  Politicus  is  thus  a  statesman.  No  one  can 
attain  this  character  who  is  not  intelligent  about  the  state  and  has  not 
carried  on  political  studies.  To  be  sure  there  are  different  kinds  of 
knowledge  necessary  for  a  chancellor,  a  civic  employee,  a  minister 
of  war  or  of  finance.  All  these,  however,  find  something  which  con- 
cerns them  in  the  political  sciences.  Hence  they  must  in  the  first 
place  learn  the  whole  in  its  general  principles  and  rules.  Every 
political  function,  high  or  low,  has  in  its  affairs  a  definite  relation 
to  die  welfare  and  happiness  of  the  state  in  general.  The  state, 
however,  has  no  other  purpose  than  to  improve  and  perfect  all  that 
constitutes  the  temporal  weal  of  its  members.  The  Politicus  must 
learn  whatever  sciences,  talents,  and  preparation  are  necessary  for 
the  attainment  of  this  purpose. 

For  this  end  it  is  not  enough  to  have  the  mere  knowledge  of  the 
laws  from  the  pandects  and  the  theory  of  civic  processes.  Rather 
is  it  one  of  the  most  important  and  necessary  sciences  of  a  Politicus 
to  know,  in  a  way  that  is  applicable  to  practice,  how  to  make  a  land 
progressively  richer,  how  to  make  improvements  in  the  application 
of  the  riches  to  the  security  and  need  and  convenient  life  of  the  mem- 
bers of  the  state,  etc. 

The  most  general  theorems  and  rules  of  this  science  are  found 
in  the  theory  of  general  civic  prudence  [allgemeine  Staatsklugheil]. 
But  this  great  portion  of  political  science  needs  to  be  taught  much 
more  thoroughly,  clearly,  and  circumstantially  than  in  this  general 
theory.  This  is  done  in  the  Kameralwissenschaften,  which  are 
composed  of  General-  und  Spedal-Oekonomie,  of  the  Polizeiwissen- 

I  Vide  Stieda,  pp.  3,  4. 


238  THE  CAMERALISTS 

schajiy  which  is  based  upon  them,  and  of  the  science  vom  Finanz- 
tind  Kammerwesen  der  Filrsttn. 

For  further  details  Zincke  refers  to  his  Grundriss,  in  accordance 
with  which  he  had  lectured  and  intended  to  continue  his  lectures. 
Since  however  not  everybody  has  the  patience  in  detail,  but  people 
rather  concent  themselves  with  a  historical  concept  and  at  the  same 
time  with  other  fragments  of  knowledge  in  political  and  civic  affairs, 
that  course  in  general  civics  is  particularly  to  be  desired.  He  urges, 
moreover,  after  he  has  argued  for  the  study  of  Kameralwissenschaft 
in  general,  still  another  course  '*de  notitia  statuum,"  in  which,  for 
the  sake  of  general  culture,  the  needs  of  those  shall  be  supplied  who 
do  not  purpose  to  make  a  career  in  the  departments  for  which  he 
speaks.  He  cites  Gundling's  Zustand  der  Europdischen  Staaten, 
and  wishes  to  add  statistics  as  an  enlargement  of  the  study.  In 
this  course,  which  apparently  was  to  have  been  of  a  more  popular 
character,  the  possible  and  actual  condition  of  a  state  would  be  treated, 
and  the  relations  of  the  Policei  and  the  financial  system. 

Passing  these  preliminary  and  elementary  forms  of  his 
theory,  we  must  take  into  account  the  evidence  afforded  by 
Zincke's  work  upon  the  second  edition  of  Stisser's  Einleitung.^ 

Stisser  (1689-1739),  could  be  passed  over  with  a  few  words, 
if  further  reference  to  him  were  not  necessary  in  order  fairly 
to  report  Zincke.  Stisser  was  a  student  of  law  and  philosophy 
at  Jena  and  Halle  and  might  have  gravitated  into  an  academic 
career  if  he  had  not  evinced  notable  administrative  talent. 

•  Fricdrich  Ulrich  Stissers,  Ehemahligen  Fiirstl.  Braunschweig- 
Liinehurgl.  Amtmanns  und  nachherigen  K.  Pr.  Krieges-  und  Domainen- 
Ralhs  Einleitung  zur  Land-Wirthschaft  und  Policey  der  Teutschen.  Zum 
Unterricht  in  Oeconomie-  Policey-  und  Cammer-Wesen  eingerichtet. 
Nunmero  aher  von  neuen  iihersehen,  an  vielen  Often  verbessert,  vermehret 
und  hrauchharer  auf  Verlangen  gemachet,  wie  auch  mit  noch  mehr  His- 
torischen  NachrictUen  von  denen  Geschdflen  und  Schriften,  auch  mit 
einer  neuen  Vorrede  versehen  von  D.  Georg  Heinrich  Zincken,  Hoch- 
furstl.  Braunschweigischen  wurckl.  Hof-  und  Cammer-Rath,  Prof.  Juris 
und  Cameralium  auf  der   Universitdt  Helmstddt  und  des  HochfUrstl. 

CoUegii  Carolini  in  Braunschweig  Curatore 1746.     (First  edilion, 

^735)     Roscher  (p.  376)  erroneously  dates  this  second  edition  1748. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ZINCKE  239 

While  in  practical  employment  at  Jena  (1734-35),  he  was 
allowed  to  lecture  in  the  university  on  the  economic  sciences, 
and  the  Forst-  und  Jagd-Wesen  der  Deutschen. 

Besides  the  book  just  mentioned,  Stisser  published  in  1734 
Ein  Programma  von  der  Moglichkeit,  dass  die  oekonomischen 
Wissenschaften  in  eine  Lehrart  gebracht  werden  kdnnen,  massen 
ein  elendes  Vorurteil  vormahls  auch  die  grossten  Gelehrten  vmi 
der  Unm'dglichkeit  dieses  Vornehmens  eingenommen  hatte. 
In  1737  the  work  appeared  w^hich  is  rated  as  the  most  meri- 
torious of  his  writings,  Die  Forst-  und  Jagd-Historie  der 
Teutschen. 

It  appears  from  Zincke's  testimony  that  the  publication 
of  the  two  books  which  marked  his  professional  residence  at 
Jena  was  the  occasion  of  speedy  termination  of  Stisser's 
academic  career.  The  book  on  forestry  and  hunting  was 
dedicated  to  the  king  of  Prussia,  and  that  expert  in  manage- 
ment was  so  much  impressed  with  the  author's  knowledge 
of  afifairs,  as  evinced  by  both  this  and  the  Land-Wirthschaft, 
that  he  called  him  to  Berlin,  in  order  to  test  his  information 
and  judgment  orally.  As  a  consequence,  Frederich  VVilhelm  I 
gave  him  an  appointment  at  Stettin.^ 

It  was  Stisser's  plan  to  write  a  second  volume,  Stadt-Wirth- 
schaft,  and  a  third,  Wirthschaft  grosser  Herren.  In  explaining 
his  relation  to  Stisser's  book,  Zincke  says  (p.  14): 

As  I  began  to  lecture  upon  the  Cameral-Wissenschajten  to  the 
students  at  Leipzig,  I  looked  for  a  complete  hand-  and  reading-book 
which  would  present  the  subject  in  brief  and  systematic  form.  I 
found,  to  be  sure,  the  sainted  Herm  Dietmar's  Einleitung,  which 
surveyed  the  whole  field,  but  in  its  special  divisions  consisted  merely 
of  a  few  scattered  observations,  with  defective  fundamental  ideas, 
or  none  at  all,  and  in  many  cases  employing  far  too  general  theorems. 
»  "Krieges-  und  Domainen-Rath  in  der  Pommerischen  Cammer 
zu  Stettin,  mit  einem  Gehalt  von  66  Rthl."  Zincke's  date  for  this  trans- 
fer (1734)  is  obviously  a  misprint  for  1737.  Stisser  died  two  years  later, 
at  the  age  of  fifty-one. 


240  THE  CAMERALISTS 

The  sainted  Herm  Stisser's  Einleiiung  was  in  many  respects,  especially 
in  organization  of  the  material,  more  according  to  my  taste.  It 
contained  more  complete  conceptions,  and  united  the  Policey-Wesen 
with  Oeconomie  in  a  practical  way.  At  the  same  time  it  treated  only 
Land-Wirthschajt  and  Land-Policey,  and  was  consequently  not 
complete  enough  to  serve  me  as  an  outline  of  all  Cameral-Wissen- 
schajten.  Beyond  that,  moreover,  I  valued  highly  the  practical 
and  still  compact  arrangement  of  this  little  book:  yet  I  was  told  that 
it  lacked  much  on  the  systematic  side  of  pedagogy,  that  the  sainted 
man  was  neither  a  good  methodologist  nor  an  adequate  philosopher, 
and  that  a  teacher  of  these  sciences  should  be  both.  I  was  told  that 
certain  fundamental  ideas  might  be  better  defined,  and  that  various 
of  Stisser's  particular  opinions  were  not  accepted  by  all  specialists 
in  Wirthschaft  and  Policey.  For  these  reasons  I  could  not  use  the 
book  for  my  purposes.  Hence  I  decided  to  publish  my  well-known 
Crund-Riss  einer  Einleiiung  zu  denen  Cameral-Wissenschajten,  in 
two  parts,  1742  and  1743.  In  the  first  part  I  presented  the  general 
and  special  principles  of  the  Land-  und  Stadl-Wirihschaffi  of  the 
Germans,  and  of  Policey,  with  a  view  to  their  application  by  the  sev- 
eral Collegiorum,  and  also  for  pedagogical  use.  In  the  second  part 
I  presented  die  Wirthschafjt  grosser  Herm  oder  das  Cammer-  und 
Finanz-Wesen.  Yet  this  was  a  mere  sketch  of  a  much  larger  woric 
and  of  a  much  more  complete  treatment  which  would  be  of  no  use 

for  beginners Before  coming  to  completion  of  this  larger 

work  I  fell  back  upon  Stisser's  Einleiiung  ....  which  I  thought 
I  could  make  useful  for  beginners,  at  least  in  certain  parts  of  ...  . 
Land-Wirthschajt  and  Land-Policey 

In  his  Preface  Stisser  says  that  Christianus  Thomasius  was 
the  first,  so  far  as  he  knew,  to  give  his  hearers  a  collection  of 
brief  propositions,  as  an  accompaniment  of  his  lectures.  Then 
Gentzke,  Bierling,  Beyer,  Gundling,  and  many  others  imitated 
him,  including  Professor  Diethmar  at  Franckfurt  and  Herr 
Hofrat  Schmeizel  at  Halle.  Apparently  he  meant  to  say  that 
these  theorems  were  in  German,  for  he  emphasizes  the  fact 
that  after  some  hesitation,  he  decided  to  follow  the  lead  of 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ZINCKE  241 

Thomasius,  and  present  the  substance  of  his  teaching  "in 
honest  German  garb." 

After  a  quaint  discussion  of  the  current  overvaluation  of 
the  advantages  to  be  gained  by  foreign  travel,  he  urges  that 
Germans  may  profit  most  by  studying  the  accumulated  prac- 
tical wisdom  of  their  own  country,  the  ways  and  means  of 
industrial  thrift  first  of  all. 

He  joins  in  the  discussion  of  the  question  why  this  impor- 
tant subject  has  had  so  little  attention  in  the  universities,  and 
curiously  enough  he  puts  the  chief  blame  on  the  students. 
He  says  they  prefer  to  give  their  time  and  money,  Veneri  et 
Baccho,  to  learning  what  would  enable  them  to  earn  their 
bread.  At  all  events,  they  regard  it  as  disgraceful  and  beneath 
their  dignity  to  soil  themselves  with  "low-lived  economic 
sciences."    Against  this  prejudice  Stisser  stoutly  maintains: 

These  sciences  are  parts  of  the  greatest  Staats-Wissenschaft, 
yes  the  soul  in  the  civic  body,  and  have  the  special  use  of  showing 
how  a  great  lord  may  bring  his  land  and  people  to  prosperity 

According  to  Zincke's  explanation  of  his  editorial  work 
on  Stisser's  book,  it  would  be  unsafe  to  pass  judgment  upon 
the  author,  without  comparing  the  original  edition.  Nothing 
appears  in  evidence,  however,  to  show  that  he  was  in  any  way 
in  advance  of  Gasser  in  the  particular  respects  with  which 
we  are  concerned.  We  may  therefore  dismiss  him  from  con- 
sideration, and  turn  our  attention  again  directly  to  Zincke. 

The  next  evidence  of  Zincke's  individual  views  appears 
in  his  modification  of  the  plan  of  Stisser's  book.  As  he  states 
it  in  his  Preface  (pp.  20,  21),  this  modification  consists  in  pre- 
senting "first  the  Cammer-Wissenscha/teny  then  in  outlining 
Oeconomie  in  general,  of  which  the  Land-Wirthschaft  und 
Policey  of  the  Germans  is  only  a  special  part."  Then  Zincke 
explains  that  he  has  assembled  "the  most  general  rules  of 
management  {Wirthschafftsregeln),  and  has  furnished  an 
introduction    to    the    study    of    oeconomischen    Wissenschafft 


242  THE  CAMERALISTS 

itself,  in  a  form  which  is  adequate  preparation  for  these  sub- 
jects." Certain  of  the  details  in  the  introduction  are  impor- 
tant way  marks  for  our  purpose.  Beyond  these,  the  book  is 
devoted  entirely  to  rural  management.  We  should  note, 
however,  that  Zincke  has  enriched  the  book  with  references 
to  authorities  to  such  an  extent  that  the  authors'  index  fills 
twenty-four  and  a  half  double-column  pages.  If  we  had  found 
no  evidence  of  a  similar  sort  in  the  earlier  writers  of  this  group, 
Zincke's  bibliography  would  alone  be  enough  to  demonstrate 
the  absurdity  of  the  tradition  which  von  Mohl  repeats  in  the 
passage  quoted  above.* 

The  most  significant  propositions  of  the  introduction  may 
be  epitomized  as  follows: 

The  subject  of  the  book  is  the  rural  management  of  the  Germans 
[Land-Wirthschafft  der  Teutschen].  This  is  a  special  part  of  the 
management  [Wirthschafjt]  of  this  people  in  general,  and  this  depends 
to  a  certain  extent  upon  the  whole.  It  also  presupposes  various 
general  ideas  of  Wirthschafjl  and  Hausshaltung  (§i). 

The  word  Wirthschajjt  is  sometimes  used  in  a  very  comprehensive, 
sometimes  in  a  very  restricted,  sense.  Thus,  (a)  for  Wirlhschaffts- 
Geschdjte  themselves;  (h)  for  the  ways  and  means  of  managing 
(Wirthschafften);  (c)  for  a  family,  considered  as  managing  {die  da 
wirthschafjut)\  (d)  for  Land-Wirthschafft  in  particular;  (e)  for  the 
science  and  art  of  understanding  one's  own  or  another's  management 
[Haushallung];  (/)  for  the  theory  and  instructions  [Lehre  und  Anwei- 
sung]  which  lead  to  prudent  ordering  of  Wirthschaffts-Geschdjte. 
This  last  is  the  meaning  which  the  word  has  in  this  book.  In  the 
same  sense  the  words  Hauss-Wirthschafft,  Occonomie,  and  Hauss- 
haltungskunst  arc  in  common  use  (§2). 

Wirthschaffl  is  thus  a  practical  theory  or  Wissenschajt,  in  which, 
according  to  their  wisdom,  prudence,  and  art,  almost  all  learned 
sciences  are  applied  to  proper  gainful  occupations,  to  the  end  that 
not  only  necessary  and  comfortable  subsistence,  but  also  a  surplus 
for  pleasure  or  need  [zu  Liebes-  und  Noth-Fdllen],  may  be  gained  (§3). 

«  Vide  pp.  12  ff. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ZINCKE  243 

Accordingly  Wirthschafjt  in  general  is  a  science  which  teaches 
prudence  in  pursuing  the  callings  which  provide  sustenance  and 
thus  justly  and  prudently  not  only  to  gain  means  of  subsistence, 
but  also  prudently  to  hold,  expend,  and  apply  the  same  (§4). 

Wirthschafjt  is  variously  subdivided:  especially  into  general 
and  special  theory;  this  latter  again  into  offentliche  Landts-Wirth- 
schajjt  and  Privat-Wirthschafft;  or  in  other  words  general  and  special 
Policey-Wissenschajt,  which  teaches  how  to  order  and  to  promote 
for  their  several  purposes,  through  good  police  laws  and  institutions, 
the  Wirthschafjts-Geschdjte  of  a  country,  a  city  or  of  an  office  (§5). 

Privat-Wirthschafft  teaches  how  each  individual  member  of 
civic  society  may  conduct  his  Wirthschafft  wisely  (§6). 

Privat-Wirthschafft  is  sometimes  divided  according  to  the  strata 
and  persons  that  manage  {wirthschafften),  sometimes  according 
to  the  things  which  are  the  objects  of  management,  sometimes  accord- 
ing to  the  basic  theorems  of  the  processes  concerned,  sometimes 
according  to  nations  (§7). 

In  the  first  case  we  have  the  Wirthschafft  (a)  of  princes,  rulers, 
and  great  lords,  with  their  Camtner-  und  Staats-Revenues,  i.  e.,  die 
Hof-  Staats-  und  Militair-Wirthschafft;  (b)  of  subjects,  since  f)ecul- 
iar  managerial  relations  spring  from  the  social  stratum  and  circum- 
stances. These  are  consequently  peculiar  rules  of  Wirthschafft 
for  (i)  the  greater  and  lesser  nobility:  (2)  soldiers;  (3)  travelers; 
(4)  citizens  of  high  and  low  degrees;  (5)  scholars,  at  schools,  univer- 
sities, in  church,  school,  and  political  offices;  (6)  rural  populations 
of  higher  and  lower  degree  and  peasants;  (7)  the  male  sex,  e.  g., 
married  and  single  persons,  boys,  young  men,  adults,  and  aged;  (8) 
the  female  sex,  in  parallel  classes;  (9)  the  poor;  (10)  the  needy; 
(11)  the  middle  class;  (12)  the  rich;  (13)  the  servant  class  (§8). 

It  would  be  an  endless  affair  to  treat  of  the  Wirthschafft  of  each 
of  these  strata  in  detail.  Hence,  with  respect  to  differences  of  stra- 
tum only  the  Haushaltung  und  Wirthschafft  of  great  lords  will  be 
considered.  In  the  theory  of  Cammer-  Rent-  und  Finanz-Wesen, 
however,  their  particular  maxims  will  be  shown  after  the  basis 
has  been  laid  in  Oeconomische  Policey-Wissenschafft.  And  precisely 
therein  consist  today  the  so-called  Cameral-Wissenschafften  in  which 
one  learns  Wirthscltafft  chiefly  with  reference  to  the  best  common 


244  THE  CAMERALISTS 

good  [das  gemeine  Beste]  and  for  the  service  of  great  lords,  the  Privat- 
Wirthschajft  of  all  others,  who  live  as  subjects  or  as  obscure  persons, 
is  shown  along  with  the  first  part  of  Oeconomischer  Policeywissen- 
schafft  (§9). 

Conformably  to  the  objects  and  transactions  of  Wirihschaffl,  the 
same  is  divided  (i)  in  accordance  with  the  chief  branches  of  business 
in  Europe,  into  the  theory  of  (a)  Land-Wirthschafft,  (b)  Stadt-Wirih- 
schafft,  which  division  was  first  made  by  P.  Fischer;  (2)  in  respect 
to  the  collateral  processes  (§10). 

We  may  briefly  describe  Land-Wirihschajft  as  that  part  of  Wirth- 
schafft  which  teaches  how  one  may  carry  on  the  cultivation  of  the 
earth,  both  upon  and  below  the  surface,  especially  upon  estates  and 
in  connection  with  the  appertaining  rights,  also  cattle  feeding  and 
particularly  cattle  raising,  so  wisely  and  prudently  that  one  may 
by  appropriate  means  gain  all  sorts  of  profit  and  advantage,  retain 
the  same,  and  turn  it  to  thrifty  application  [hauswirthlich  anwenden] 

(§13)- 

Die  Wirthschafjt  consists  of  J^arious  doctrines  [Lehren].  It  con- 
tains especially  general  theoretical  and  practical  theorems,  which 
are  final  rules.  These  consist  either  of  fundamental  theorems  from 
other  sciences,  or  of  fundamental  theorems  and  rules  peculiar  to 
Oeconomia  generali.^  The  former  are  derived  especially  from  (i) 
general  and  special  Rechts-Gdehrsamkeit;  (2)  Natur-Lehre,  Chytnie, 
Anatomie,  and  Artzney-Kunst;  (3)  Mathematics,  especially  Rechen- 
kunstf  Geometrie,  Mechanique,  and  Baukunst;  (4)  general  Stoats- 
und  Privat-Klugheit  (§14). 

Die  Wirthschafft  consists  further  (2)  of  special  theorems  and 
rules  pertaining  to  the  chief  objects  and  transactions  of  Land-  und 
Stadt-Wirthschafft,  to  their  auxiliary  transactions,  and  to  the  Wirth- 
schafft  of  this  and  that  sort  of  persons.  Here  we  present  the  theorems 
about  the  principal  and  subsidiary  phases  of  Land-Wirthschap 
and  about  the  persons  engaged  in  the  same.  This  belongs  under 
the  head  Specialia  (§15). 

»  Zincke  remarks  in  a  note,  "These  have  been  presented  best  by 
Hr.  Lie.  Hofmann  in  his  6rst  book,  Klugheit  Haus  xu  halten."  This 
is  G.  A.  Hoffmann.  The  remainder  of  the  title  of  the  book  is:  odtr 
^udetUia  oeconomica  vulgaris;  4  vols.,  1730-49.     Vide  Roscher,  p.  436. 


CAMERALISTICS  Ol'  ZLNCKE  245 

Finally  l>elong  to  Wirthschafjt  (3)  Sitif^ularia  or  ihc  most  particu- 
lar observations  and  devices.  Moreover  we  must  mention  (4)  the 
Wirlhschafjts-Termini  or  Kunst-W drier,  Redens-Arten,  and  expla- 
nations of  the  same'  (§16). 

Die  Wirlhschajjt  varies  also  with  respect  to  nations  or  peojjles, 
and  it  is  certain  that  the  former  [Wirthschafjt]  vaiies  as  widely  as 
the  latter,  their  soil  and  climate.  Not  to  speak  of  the  uncivilized 
peoples  outside  of  F^urope,  the  Land-  und  Stadl-Wirlhschafjt  of  the 
civilized  Euro[)eans,  for  example  of  the  French,  Spanish,  Italians, 
English,  Dutch,  Poles,  Swedes,  etc.,  differs,  in  resfx^ct  to  very  many 
Wirthschaffts-Geschdjten,  especially  in  respect  to  particular  arrange- 
ments, purposes,  and  objects,  from  that  of  the  Germans,  and  indeed 
the  latter  varies  not  only  by  contrast  l^tween  the  ancient  and  the 
modem,  but  also  by  contrasts  lx;tween  the  various  German  i)eoples 
and  localities  at  present.  Thus  there  are  the  difTerences  Ixjtween 
the  Ober-Sachsen,  der  Nieder-Sachsen,  der  Schwaben,  der  Schweitzer , 
etc.  Herr  von  Rohr  accordingly,  and  not  without  reason,  made  a 
plea  for  more  information  and  cultivation  of  oeconomia  harmonica.* 
Meanwhile  it  is  the  duty  of  Germans  to  pay  special  attention  to  the 
most  common  features  of  the  Wirthschafjt  of  Germans,  and  to  under- 

«  The  bibliography  of  this  part  of  the  subject,  as  cited  by  Zinckc, 
is  notable:  viz.,  "(i)  Das  Cheminizische  Oeconomische  Lexicon,  new  ed., 
Niirnberg,  1746;  (2)  Chommel  Diction.  Oeconomique;  (3)  Das  allge- 
meine  Oeconomische  Lexic.,  so  vormahls  schon  bey  Glcditschen  in  Leip- 
zig herausgekommen,  an.  1744,  aber  von  mir  dem  jezgcn  Editore  dicser 
Einleitung,  vermehret  und  verbesscrt  herausgegebcn  wordcn;  (4) 
Savery,  Lexic.  de  Commerce,  ed.  n.;  (5)  Das  bey  Heinsio  in  Leipzig  edirlc 
Handels- Lexic.  suh.  Tit.  AUgemeine  Schatz-Cammer  der  Kaufmannschaff, 
in  4  Theilen  und  einem  Supplem.,  ed.  in  foL,  1741;  (6)  Bciers,  Allge- 
meines  Handlungs-  Kunst-  Berg-  und  Handwercks- Lexic.,  von  D.  Slrubcn 
ed.  in  4to,  an.  1722;  (7)  Das  in  Berlin  von  einem  Gliede  der  Societat  der 
Wissenschaften  herausgekommene  Real-Lexicon  der  Wissenschaften; 
(8)  Das  bey  Gleditschen  herausgekommene  Natur-  Berg-  Gewerck-  und 
Handlungs-Lex.;  (9)  Minerophili  Berg-Wercks- Lexicon;  (10)  Mein 
D.  Zinckens  Manufactur-  und  Handwercks-Lexic.,  so  jctzt  unlcr  der 
Presse  und  von  Fuchsen  allhier  ediret  wird." 

»  In  his  Hausshaltungs-Bibliothek,  ed.  1726,  p.  129.  Vide  dilso  Hrn. 
von  Uohberg,  Adlichen  Land-Wirthschafft  (Zincke). 


246  THE  CAMERALISTS 

stand  it  according  to  the  manner,  customs,  usages,  laws,  and  civic 
organization  of  their  own  country.  This  book  is  specially  devoted 
to  that  purpose  (§17). 

This  passage  is  at  once  symptomatic  of  the  whole  camera- 
listic  conception  of  economic  problems,  and  it  is  a  rather  excep- 
tionally clear  and  unequivocal  expression  of  the  conception. 
It  is  thus  one  of  the  crucial  exhibits  in  the  body  of  evidence 
which  sustains  one  of  the  principal  contentions  of  our  argument: 
viz.,  the  theories  of  the  cameralists  were  formulations  of  differ- 
ent sorts  of  utility  with  reference  to  relatively  parochial  aims. 
They  were  not  attempted  generalizations  of  universal  economic 
or  civic  relations,  because  universal  relations  of  these  orders  had 
not  roused  their  attention  or  interest  in  an  appreciable  degree. 
They  were  virtually  attempts  to  answer  the  question:  "Situ- 
ated as  we  are,  and  being  what  wc  are,  individually  and  politi- 
cally, how  can  we  use  our  opportunities  so  as  most  to  further 
our  particular  purposes  ?"  A  stage  of  experience  characterized 
by  this  range  of  generalization  must  be  taken  for  granted,  and 
accepted  just  as  it  was.  We  turn  the  reality  of  experience 
into  myth  and  fable  if  we  interpret  back  into  such  intermediate 
experience  the  states  of  mind  which  emerged  at  later  stages. 
In  brief,  we  must  interpret  the  cameralists  as  they  were,  not 
as  nineteenth-century  economists.  We  do  not  satisfy  this 
requirement  merely  by  pointing  out  that  their  conclusions 
differed  from  those  of  nineteenth-century  economists.  That 
way  of  stating  it  covers  up  and  compromises  the  crucial 
distinction.  In  an  essential  sense,  the  cameralists  were  not 
concerned  about  the  same  problems  tluU  engaged  the  nine- 
teenth-century political  economists.  This  experience  of  the 
cameralists  has  value  for  modem  men;  and  historical 
scholars  must  find  and  utilize  the  value.  The  experience 
has  been  shorn  of  its  value  by  growth  of  a  tradition  which 
vitiates  our  interpretation  in  advance  by  ignoring  the  radical 
contrast  between  the  Smithian  and  the  pre-Smitbian  atti- 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ZINCKK  2^7 

tudc  of  mind  toward   economic  relations.     The  introduction 
continues: 

Whoever  would  thoroughly  Icam  \Virthscha/jt  in  the  special 
department  of  Po/tce>'-  und  Cammer-Wesens  must  gain  iIk-  knowledge 
through  instruction  and  experience.  The  instruction  must  consist 
in  part  of  coherent  oral  discourse  upon  Wirlhschajjl  as  a  whole,  and 
afterward  upon  a  portion  of  the  same  upon  which  one  proposes  to 
place  the  chief  emphasis;  in  part  through  oral  instructions  incidenial 
to  practice  itself,  and  through  association  with  expt.rienced  llanss- 
wirthen,  and  in  part  through  the  reading  of  good  Wirthschajjls- 
Buclter  (§18). 

Whoever  will  thus  study  Wirthschafjl  must  have  learned  |)re- 
viously  (i)  to  write  and  reckon  well;  (2)  to  form  a  good  concept; 
and  the  rudiments  of  (3)  der  Moral;  (4)  Xalur-Lehrc  und  llisloriain 
naturalcm;  (5)  die  Chyntie;  (6)  die  Ccomrtriam,  archilrcturam 
civilem,  and  especially  die  Mechanique;  (7)  .something  of  Mcdicin; 
(8)  something  of  the  laws.  Before  all  things,  however,  one  must 
attempt,  through  the  grace  of  God,  to  put  oneself  in  the  situation 
in  which  one  can  actually  exercise  the  first  general  Wirthschafjls- 
Kegel  of  the  Christians:  "Seek  ye  first  the  Kingdom  of  (iod  and 
his  righteousness,  and  all  these  things  shall  be  added  unto  you"  (§  to). 

Beyond  this,  all  depends  (1)  on  vcr\'  careful  consifleration  and 
investigation  of  the  wirthschafjilichen  Ohjecte,  Zwecke  und  hrsondercr 
Geschdfte,  and  especially  upon  understanding  and  choice  of  the 
persons  concerned:  through  all  this,  moreover,  upon  cautious  deci- 
sions in  wirthschajjllichen  Dingen;  (2)  upon  a  diligent,  careful, 
energetic,  and  industrious  carrying-out  of  the  precepts  and  applica- 
tions in  general,  to  the  end  of  gaining  good  returns  from  the  f)ccupa- 
tion,  of  caring  well  for  them  through  frugality  and  watchfulness, 
without  greed.  Finally,  uf)on  applying  to  those  ends  all  temporal 
means  according  to  God's  law  and  according  to  wirlhschajjUiclirn 
Klugheit,  and  especially  upon  so  ordering  outlays  that  an  annual 
surplus  will  remain  (§20). 

We  now  return  to  Zincke's  own  books.  Most  important 
for  our  purpose  is,  first,  the  Cameraliskn-Bihliothek.^ 

'  T).  Clcorg  Hcinrith  Zinckcns,  Herzogl.  Brauns(hw.  wirtkl.  Ilof- 
und  Cammcr-Raths,  etc.,  Cameralisten  Bibliolhek,   Worinne  nehsl  der 


348  THE  CAMERALISTS 

A  general  description  of  these  compact  little  volumes  would 
afford  but  a  vague  idea  of  their  contents.  It  will  not  be  pos- 
sible to  present  an  adequate  outline  of  Zincke's  system,  because 
that  would  require  as  much  space  as  can  be  given  to  the  author 
who  may  on  the  whole  most  fairly  be  taken  as  an  epitome  of 
cameralism,  viz.,  Justi.  To  differentiate  Zincke's  system  from 
Justi's,  it  would  be  necessary  to  go  into  comparison  of  technical 
details  in  the  two  authors;  and  that  would  be  foreign  to  our 
purpose.  Without  attempting  to  pass  upon  the  delicate  ques- 
tion of  the  relative  merits  of  the  two  men,  we  must  confine  our- 
selves here  to  certain  specifications  which  show  that  Zincke 
was  among  the  formative  factors  in  the  social  science  of  his 
period. 

Indeed,  there  are  more  evident  motions  in  the  direction  of 
Smithism,  in  Zincke's  most  general  methodological  observa- 
tions, than  in  any  other  writer  in  the  series.  He  perceived,  in 
a  vague,  abortive,  fashion  to  be  sure,  that  the  details  of  camera- 
listic  policy  required  a  center  in  more  fundamental  philosophy. 
His  attempts  at  foundation  of  such  a  philosophy  are  rather 
pathetic,  but  on  the  other  hand  his  contemporaries  did  not 
even  make  the  attempt.  Whether  Zincke  actually  saw  deeper 
than  Gerhard  had  penetrated  cannot  be  known.  At  all  events 
he  published  his  ideas  much  more  extensively,  and  it  is  plain 
that  his  mind  was  maturing  in  the  direction  of  such  problems 

Anleitung  die  Cameral-Wissenschaft  zu  Uhren  und  zu  lernen,  tin  volt- 
sldndiges  Verzeichniss  der  Bucher  und  SchrifUn  von  der  Land-  und  Stadt- 
Oeconomie,  dem  Policey-  Finanz  und  Cammer-Wesen  zu  finden,  so  theils 
kurz  beurtheilet,  theils  umstdndlich  vorgestellet  warden.     Der  erste  Theil, 

von  der  Oeconomie 1751  (304  pages);    "Zweyter  Theil,  von  der 

Policey- Wissenschaft,  1751"  (270  pages);  "Dritter  Theil,  von  der  Cam- 

mer-  und  Finanz-Wissenschaft 1752"    (354   pages);     "Vierter 

und   Letzter  Theil.     Nebst  vollstandigem   gedoppelten   Register  ilber 

alle  vier  Theile I75*"  (210  pages).     In  addition,  the  authors' 

index  occupies  58  pages,  and  the  subject-index,  36  pages,  besides  four 
pages  of  errata. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ZINCKE  249 

as  Smith  afterward  proposed.  Zincke's  place  in  the  cameralis- 
tic  succession  may  best  be  indicated  by  a  few  characteristic 
details. 

Zincke  was  the  first  German  writer,  so  far  as  I  have  been 
able  to  discover,  to  insist  strongly  upon  a  sharp  distinction 
between  vulgar  and  learned  economic  theory.  Beginning  in 
the  Introduction  (pp.  7,  8),  and  continuing  through  the  classi- 
fications in  the  bibliographies,  he  tries  to  show  the  difference 
between  the  folk-lore  of  familiar  occupations,  and  "learned" 
theory.  His  impulse  was  respectably  scientific  in  its  concep- 
tion. He  had  not  gone  very  far  in  his  analysis  of  the  kinds 
of  research  which  would  be  necessary  before  "learned"  theory 
could  establish  a  relatively  secure  base.  Zincke  maintained 
valiantly,  against  the  overwhelming  academic  prejudice  of  his 
time,  that  the  subjects  properly  included  within  the  scope  of 
cameralistics  were  capable  of  organization  into  a  group  of 
sciences  as  methodical  and  respectable  as  those  which  had 
already  won  academic  recognition. 

In  supporting  this  thesis,  Zincke  argued  (pp.  16,  17)  that 
a  system  of  cameralistic  science  must  rest  upon  applications 
of  doctrines  accepted  by  philosophical,  mathematical,  legal, 
and  other  sciences.  "In  so  far  as  those  theorems  are  truths 
established  by  other  sciences,  we  may  take  them  for  granted  in 
cameral  science."  The  list  of  such  truths  which  he  cites  as 
the  philosophical  antecedents  of  cameralistic  science  hardly 
impresses  the  modem  reader  with  the  solidity  of  the  support, 
but  such  as  it  is  we  may  reduce  it  to  this: 

A  means  [Mitiel]  is  something  in  which  the  sufficient  ground  is 
contained  through  which  to  reach  a  given  end.  We  all  have  a  natural 
longing  for  welfare.  That  is  an  end  which  all  men  by  nature  seek. 
All  our  lives  we  strive  for  this  condition,  which  we  call  happiness 
[GlUckseligkeit].  Progress  toward  this  condition  we  call  temporal 
happiness,  and  the  things  which  contribute  to  it  may  serve  either  our 
bodies  or  our  souls  or  both.    Such  things  we  call  our  goods.    A 


250  THE  CAMERALISTS 

stock  of  such  temporal  goods  we  call  temporal  means  [Vermdgen].^ 
Transactions  with  these  means,  or  the  actual  use  of  the  same  for 
the  above  specified  end,  we  call,  in  a  somewhat  narrow  sense  to  be 
sure,  livelihood  [Nahrung].' 

It  need  not  be  argued  that  the  need  of  using  these  tempwral 
means  for  gaining  our  happiness  makes  it  both  the  right  and  the 
duty  both  of  the  individual  man  and  of  whole  societies,  especially 
of  those  heads  of  societies  to  whom  the  citizens  have  intrusted  the 
supreme  power  over  themselves,  in  order  to  insure  temporal  happi- 
ness, to  apply  these  means  in  every  proper  way  to  gain  the  happiness 
of  all.  We  have  then  the  three  most  general  kinds  of  transaction 
in  all  management  [Wirthschaft],  viz.,  the  gaining,  the  guarding,  and 
the  applying  of  temporal  means.  These  three  kinds  of  transaction 
are  explained  in  General-Oeconomic  (§13). 

In  the  same  portion  of  cameral  science  this  principle  will  be 
demonstrated,  viz.,  a  prince,  as  the  ruling  head  of  a  civic  society,  whether 
the  same  consists  of  a  physical  or  a  moral  person,  for  the  maintenance 
in  part  of  his  sovereignty,  his  house,  and  his  own  exalted  person, 
partly  the  common  good  [gem^inen  Bestens]  of  his  state,  must  strive 
to  gain,  keep,  and  apply  a  proportional  amount  of  ready  means 
[bereitestes  Vermogen]  (§14).^ 

'  For  reasons  already  alluded  to  (vtJ«  above,  p.  76;  cf.  pp.  367  and  373) 
and  which  will  appear  more  fully  later,  it  is  necessary  to  render  Mittel  and 
Vermogen  by  the  same  term.  We  shall  have  little  to  do  with  the  former 
term  in  the  technical  sense  which  Zincke  tries  to  impress  upon  it,  while 
the  latter  figures  very  prominently  in  the  theories  that  follow.  It  is 
necessary  to  protect  it  against  the  unauthorized  legal  additions  forced 
into  it  by  the  rendering  "property." 

'  It  is  impossible  to  choose  a  rendering  of  such  terms  which  can  be 
used  consistently  even  in  translating  single  authors.  They  vary  indefinitely 
in  the  usage  of  the  writers  in  this  group  (§§io,  11). 

3  One  of  the  incidental  questions  which  this  study  raises  is  as  to  the 
possible  effect  of  this  mere  phrase  upon  the  suggestibility  of  actual  rulers 
during  the  eighteenth  century.  The  idea  of  the  "readiest"  means 
undoubtedly  carried  with  it  the  snap  judgment  of  best  means,  and  thus 
one  of  the  impulses  was  given  to  exaggeration  in  practice  of  the  stimulus 
applied  to  trade  as  a  producer  of  national  revenue. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ZINCKE  251 

The  keynote  of  cameralism  is  struck  by  Zincke  in  the  next 
paragraph : 

The  more  a  prince,  by  observance  of  this  duty,  is  able  to  promote 
his  own  and  his  country's  welfare  and  more  complete  condition  (sic), 
the  greater  will  he  be.  For  herein  is  to  be  found  the  true  ground  of 
the  external  greatness  of  a  prince.  The  greater  he  becomes,  however, 
the  more  must  he  have  ready  means,  and  consequently  the  more 
must  he  endeavor  to  procure,  to  guard,  and  to  apply  the  same  (§15). 

All  ready  means,  and  consequently  those  of  a  prince,  consist 
of  income  [Einkiinjten].  Hence  there  must  be  sources  from  which 
it  is  derived.'  An  irrefutable  and  indubitable  truth  is  therefore: 
That  a  prince  is  bound  [schuldig  und  verpflichtet]  to  recognize  the 
first  general  and  permanent  source  of  his  ready  means,  and  to  estab- 
lish the  same  upon  that  source  (§16). 

Where  then  is  this  source  to  be  found  ?  The  source  of  the  ready 
means  of  the  whole  human  race  is  well  known.  Created  animate 
and  inanimate  nature,  especially  however  the  earth  with  its  creatures, 
its  forces,  all  men  themselves,  and  created  things  outside  of  them, 
are  the  sources  from  which  they  derive  everything  to  be  used  as 
means  [Vermogen].'  God  himself  is  indeed  the  first  founder  of 
this  source,  through  his  wise  and  beneficent  creation,  preservation, 
and  care  of  men.  All  powers  of  bodily  movement  and  of  the  exer- 
cise of  the  soul  are  to  be  included  in  this  source.  But  each  individual, 
and  each  smaller  or  larger  society,  controls  only  a  certain  portion 
of  this  source  of  ready  means.  This  control  is  exercised  partly  by 
virtue  of  the  native  power  of  the  individual  or  the  society,  partly 
through  the  two  chief  natural  (sic)  institutions  of  the  world,  namely, 
property  and  nilership  [Eigenthum  und  Herrschajt].  Accordingly 
»  Zincke  uses  the  French  word/on<f,  but  in  apposition  with  it  the  Ger- 
man words  Quellen  and  Grund.  The  sense  is  sometimes  merely  "  source  " 
in  general;  sometimes  "fund"  in  a  more  special  use,  and  sometimes  a 
close  approach  to  the  modern  technical  concept  "capital."  Without 
representing  the  unstable  condition  of  Zincke's  ideas  at  this  point,  the' 
term  "source"  will  fairly  translate  the  essential  thoughts  in  this  connection. 
»  In  this  particular  passage  the  author  approaches  as  close  as  the 
conceptions  of  his  time  would  permit  to  the  plain  formula,  "Natiu-e  is 
the  ultimate  source  of  wealth." 


2$^  THE  CAMERALISTS 

no  one  can  bring  the  whole  source  under  his  property  or  ruler^'p, 
and  it  is  therefore  impossible  and  consequently  foolish  to  make  the 
attempt  (§i8). 

The  portion  of  the  earth  controlled  by  a  collection  of  men  must 
then  be  the  immediate  source  of  their  ready  means  (§19). 

Since  endeavor  after  secure  and  comfortable  life  has  made  it 
necessary  for  such  collections  of  men  to  unite  their  property  and 
powers  in  the  single  will  of  a  ruler,  and  to  a  certain  degree,  with  respect 
to  these  two  chief  matters,  to  subject  themselves  to  the  same,  and 
thus  the  concept  state  or  civic  society  arises;  it  follows  unquestionably 
that  the  immediate  source  of  the  ready  means  of  a  ruler  in  general 
can  be  no  other  than  his  land  and  people,  or  so-called  Territorium 
(§20). 

In  order  to  show  the  local  and  temporal  shading  of  this 
idea  in  the  cameralistic  view  the  next  section  is  translated 
in  full: 

I  assert  with  zeal  that  this  is  the  immediate  source  of  ready 
means  in  general.  For  since  lands,  and  the  people  in  the  same,  in 
spite  of  all  this,  according  to  the  great  law  of  God  respecting  the 
social  helpfulness  with  which  human  welfare  is  bound  up,  are  in  a 
certain  interdependence,  and  hence  each  land  and  people  can  and 
must  at  the  same  time  make  use  of  the  means  of  another  land  and 
people  for  the  welfare  of  the  former,  and  conversely  can  and  must 
with  its  own  means  and  powers  help  the  other  land;  so  one  may 
say  that  to  a  certain  extent,  and  in  an  indirect  or  distant  way,  by 
virtue  of  this  interdependence  of  lands  and  peoples,  the  means  and 
the  powers  of  the  same  are  and  must  be  of  assistance  as  a  source 
of  ready  means  for  a  ruler  over  land  and  people.  Moreover  one 
of  the  most  important  portions  of  the  cameralistic  sciences  is  that 
which  shows  the  ways  in  which  other  lands  may  rightly  and  wisely 
be  made  into  sources  of  all  sorts  of  revenues  and  profits  (§21). 

Speaking  now  more  precisely,  the  source  of  the  ready  means  of 
a  ruler  is  to  be  found  not  merely  in  land  and  people,  with  all  their 
interconnections,  but  rather  in  a  land  and  people  placed  in  a  con- 
stantly flourishing  condition  0}  their  means  of  livelihood.  Hence 
follows  the  principle:  A  prince  who  would  better  establish,  maintain. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ZINCKE  253 

and  preserve  his  ready  means,  must  devote  all  his  effort  to  put  his 
land  and  people  in  a  constantly  more  flourishing  condition  of  gaining 
the  means  of  livelihood,  and  must  thus  secure  for  them  increasing 
prosperity.  Accordingly,  the  more  services,  things  0}  money  value, 
money,  and  credit  increase,  the  greater  and  richer  is  the  source  and 
ground  of  the  ready  means  of  a  ruler  (§23). 

Using  means  of  livelihood  is  called  managing  [wirthschafjten]. 
When  the  produce  provides  not  merely  the  wants  and  conveniences 
of  physical  life,  but  also  that  excess  which  we  call  riches,  we  call  it 
good  management.  If  the  means  of  livelihood  for  a  land  and  people 
are  to  be  flourishing,  good  management  must  prevail  among  and 
over  them.  It  follows  that  the  ruler,  or  those  who  assist  him  in 
these  important  matters,  must  have  the  knowledge  necessary  to 
insure  good  management,  and  must  exert  the  utmost  endeavor 
to  secure  the  application  of  this  knowledge  throughout   the  land 

(§23). 

This  is  necessary  not  only  for  the  sake  of  promoting  good  manage- 
ment in  the  land,  and  to  put  the  people  in  the  way  of  ready  means, 
but  it  is  necessary  in  order  to  secure  the  sources  of  the  prince's  own 
ready  means  (§24). 

It  follows  that  a  prince  needs  genuine  and  skilful  cameralists. 
By  this  name  we  mean  those  who  possess  fundamental  and  s|)ecial 
knowledge  about  all  or  some  particular  part  of  those  things  which 
are  necessary  in  order  that  they  may  assist  the  prince  in  maintaining 
good  management  in  the  state  (§25). 

A  land  can  be  put  in  a  flourishing  condition  of  the  means  of  live- 
lihood only  through  good  Policey-Gesetze  und  Anstalten.  Whoever 
would  serve  the  prince  well  at  this  point  must  not  only  know  the 
existing  Policey-Gesetze,  but  he  must  understand  how  to  invent  and 
introduce  such  laws  and  institutions.  For  this  purpose  he  must 
also  understand  the  nature  and  structure  of  the  means  of  livelihood, 
or  Wirthschaft.  For  the  Policey-Gesetze  und  Anstalten  have  the  task 
of  directing  and  improving  the  means  of  livelihood  and  the  manage- 
ment of  a  people.  Hence  it  follows  that  the  science  of  making  police 
laws  and  institutions  can  neither  be  learned  nor  applied  without  the 
science  and  knowledge  of  management,  which  is  properly  called 
die  Oeconomie  in  distinction  from  der  Oeconomic,  which  means  the 


254  THE  CAMERALISTS 

actual  application.*  Whoever,  finally,  would  administer  the  ready 
means  of  rulers,  not  merely  prudently,  but  in  close  connection  with 
the  constantly  improving  conditions  of  livelihood,  and  with  sujier- 
intendence  of  the  same,  which  a  wise  ruler  exercises  through  good 
police  laws  and  institutions — he  must  have  thorough  knowledge 
of  Oeconomie  and  Policey  (§26). 

After  rehearsing  the  argument  that  all  this  cannot  be  left 
to  pure  empiricism,  but  must  be  reduced  to  expert  knowledge 
and  practice,  Zincke  compresses  his  case  into  this  proposition : 

Catneral-Wissenschajt  is  a  learned  and  practical  science,  first, 
of  inventing,  improving,  and  introducing  all  sorts  of  good  police  laws 
and  institutions  drawn  from  the  nature  and  conditions  of  the  means 
of  livelihood  of  a  land;  second,  a  science  partly  resting  ujxjn  die 
Oeconomie,  partly  upon  special  rules  and  maxims  which  set  forth 
the  rights  and  duties  of  a  ruler,  of  wisely,  prudently,  rightly,  and 
skilfully  founding,  maintaining,  increasing,  and  administering  the 
necessity,  comfort,  and  riches  of  a  land,  and  at  the  same  time  and 
thereby  the  ready  means  needed  by  the  ruler  for  the  good  of  the  state 
and  its  ruler  (§29). 

Zincke  explains,  half  apologetically,  that  this  description,  and 
the  book  itself,  were  written  not  for  the  learned,  but  for  begin- 
ners.    He  proposes  the  following  as  an  alternative  form: 

Cameral-Wissenschajt  is  a  learned  and  at  the  same  time  practical 
science,  having  as  its  object  thorough  understanding  of  all  means 
of  livelihood  and  on  that  ground  the  introduction  of  good  Policey, 
to  the  end  of  rendering  useful  services  to  states  and  rulers  in  cameral 
and  financial  affairs  (§30). 

Elaborating  the  idea  that  Camerd-Wissenschaft  consists 
of  various  WissenschafUn,  Zincke  continues: 

«  But  on  p.  55  Zincke  distinctly  defines  the  word  Oeconomie  as  mean- 
ing "die  Wirthschaft  selbsl."  Again,  in  the  Anfangsgriinde  (I,  p.  18), 
Zincke  assigns  to  the  first  part  of  Cameral-Wissenschaft:  "Die  Natur 
und  Beschaffenheit  aller  Nahrungsgeschiifte  insgemein,  und  besonders 
deutlich  und  griindlich  zu  analysiren  und  einzusehen.  Und  diesen  Theil 
nenne  ich  die  gelehrte  Oeconomie." 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ZINCKE  255 

In  my  Grundriss  I  presented  die  Oeconomic  and  Policey-Wissen- 
schaft  in  the  composite  form  of  wirthschajtliche  Policey-Wissenschaft. 
I  made  Cameral-Wissenschafi  the  first  main  division,  and  Camfner- 
und  Finanzivissenschaft  the  second.  I  have  reconsidered,  however, 
and  this  book  will  have  three  main  divisions:  (i)  Die  Oeconomic; 
(2)  die  Policey-Wissenschaft;  (3)  die  Cammer-  oder  Rent-  und  Finanz 
Wissenschaft  (§32). 

From  the  redundant  and  perplexing  variations  upon  this 
explanation  in  the  most  general  part  of  the  work,  we  abstract 
only  the  following  items: 

Oeconomic  attempts  to  teach  the  poor  how  they  may  advance  in 
means  to  the  middle  class,  the  middle  class  how  they  may  become 
rich.  Policey-Wissenschaft  shows  not  only  how  to  decrease  the  num- 
ber of  the  poor,  but  also  how  to  promote  the  interest  of  all  other 
strata,  so  that  each  in  its  way  may  enjoy  advancing  prosperity  (p.  60). 
This  does  not  mean  that  Everybody  is  to  be  brought  into  the  middle 
class,  or  everybody  to  be  made  rich.  This  is  quite  as  incorrect  as 
the  other  hateful  idea  of  certain  leaches,  who  teach  that  all,  especially 
the  peasants,  should  be  reduced  to  the  barest  necessities  of  life.  It 
means  that  all  are  to  be  put  in  the  way  of  gains  in  prosperity  propor- 
tioned to  the  lot  of  each  (pp.  61-63). 

The  first  and  most  general  principle  of  a  good  finance  system 
is  that  the  administration  shall  aim  to  insure  the  ready  means  of 
the  ruler  by  such  arrangements  as  will  at  the  same  time  promote 
the  best  good  of  the  state.  That  is,  neither  (i)  the  interest  of  the 
ruler,  nor  (2)  the  interest  of  the  state  must  be  allowed  to  infringe 
on  the  other  (pp.  68,  69). 

The  work  as  a  whole  compels  the  conclusion  that  Zincke's 
methodological  interests  excessively  handicapped  his  camera- 
listic  interests.  To  use  a  different  figure,  his  stage  machinery 
is  so  conspicuous  and  so  intricate  that  it  conceals  the  play.  At' 
the  same  time  it  is  evident  that  he  was  thinking  ahead  of  most 
of  his  academic  contemporaries.  His  perceptions  were  indis- 
tinct enough,  but  his  attempt  to  find  a  firm  basis  for  cameralis- 
tic  theory  and  to  organize  its  parts  into  a  coherent  system 


aS6  THE  CAMERALISTS 

entitles  him  to  a  place  with  the  most  intelligent  of  the  series. 
In  one  respect  he  is  easily  foremost  among  the  cameralists. 
He  published  the  first  bibliography  which  made  a  systematic 
attempt  to  classify  the  literature,  not  merely  according  to  sub- 
jects, but  according  to  degrees  of  scientific  merit.  He  had 
a  code  of  letters  indicating  the  two  main  classes  of  (a)  "learned," 
{b)  "unlearned"  books,  and  in  each  class  the  grades,  (i)  good 
(2)  very  good,  (3)  moderately  good,  (4)  bad,  (5)  very  bad. 
Besides  this  gradation,  there  are  numerous  quasi-critical  and 
other  notes.  The  bibliography  of  the  first  part  of  Cameral- 
Wissenschaftf  or  Oeconomic,  contains  975  titles,  of  which  295 
are  on  strictly  agricultural  topics,  and  172  more  relate  to  other 
extractive  industries  (Part  I,  pp.  192-304);  the  second  part, 
*^ Policey-Wissenschaft"  contains  502  titles,  of  which  164 
refer  to  agricultural  administration^  (Part  II,  pp.  441-565); 
the  third  part,  *'Camnter-  und  Finanz-Wissenschaft"  has  570 
titles  (Part  III,  pp.  780-916);  and  in  Part  IV  (pp.  1071-1134). 
There  are  243  bibliographical  notes  as  addenda  to  specified 
sections  in  the  body  of  the  work. 

At  the  end  of  the  text  (p.  11 34),  is  the  devout  ascription, 
which  flippant  critics  might  render,  to  be  sure,  in  a  way  that 
would  have  an  appositeness  quite  undesigned  by  the  author: 
"Gott  meinem  Schdpfer  allein  die  Ehre. " 

The  existence  of  this  bibliographical  monument  passes 
into  a  curious  historical  problem,  when  we  encounter  the 
contrast  presented  by  the  books  of  Justi  and  Sonnenfels.  We 
cannot  go  into  the  problem  here,  but  must  be  content  with 
simply  calling  attention  to  it. 

Passing  to  Zincke's  more  elaborate  work,'  we  find  another 

'  Again  attention  must  be  called  to  the  absurdity  oi  the  tradition 
voiced  by  von  Mohl  (above,  p.  13),  in  view  of  this  large  body  of  litera- 
ture on  the  extractive  industries. 

»  D.  Georg  Heinrich  Zinckens  An/angsgrilnde  der  Cameralwissgn- 
schaft,  worinne  dessert  Grundriss  wetter  ansgefUhret  und  verbessert  vfird. 
Des  Ersten  Thetis,  welcher  so  wohl  die  General  als  Special  Land-  und 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ZINCKE  257 

version  of  the  Cameral-Wissenschaft,  which  however,  as  the 
author  says  (I,  p.  7),  amounts  to  the  same  thing  as  the  formulas 
quoted  above,  viz.: 

It  is  a  learned  and  practical  science,  devoted  to  thorough  under- 
standing of  all  occupations  that  procure  livelihood,  to  introducing, 
in  pursuance  oF  this  knowledge,  good  Policey,  and  to  making  the 
livelihood  of  lands  increasingly  prosperous,  to' the  end  however 
not  merely  of  better  establishing,  maintaining,  and  righteously  and 
wisely  increasing  the  ready  means  of  rulers  and  states,  but  also,  by 
means  of  wise  income  and  expenditure,  to  secure  good  administra- 
tion. 

The  judgment  expressed  above  ^  must  explain  why  it  would 
not  be  profitable  to  attempt  a  digest  of  this  expansion  of  Zincke's 
Grundriss.  The  author  gives  so  much  space  to  protestation 
of  what  the  different  branches  of  cameral  science  should  prop- 
erly teach,  and  why,  and  how,  and  by  what  means,  and  to  what 
ends  they  should  teach  it,  that  it  is  easy  to  see  how  his  contem- 
poraries may  have  lost  their  patience  before  they  found  out 
whether  the  science,  as  he  advertised  it,  actually  did  any  of 
these  things.  So  far  as  attention  could  be  held  at  all  at  this 
time  by  systematized  cameralistics,  the  subject  had  to  be 
presented  with  details  in  the  foreground.  Very  few  people 
cared  for  the  more  general  methodological  settings.  Zincke's 
books  give  ample  evidence  of  profounder  and  more  compre- 
hensive views  of  the  science  than  can  be  credited  to  Justi. 
The  former,  however,  was  far  too  cameralistic  to  win  his  way 
very  widely  with  the  traditional  academicians,  while  he  was 
much  too  academic  to  make  a  strong  impression  upon  the  sort 
of  constituency  which  was  favorable  to  cameralism.  His 
books  cover  the  whole  field  of  cameralism  in  a  way  which 

Stadtoconomic     {sic)     und     Policeywissenschaft     ahhandelt Des 

Zweyten  Thetis,  welche  die  eigentliche  Finanz-  und  Cammerwissenschaft 

enthalt Leipzig i755- 

'  Vide  pp.  35a  fF. 


258  THE  CAMERALISTS 

was  related  to  the  interests  of  practical  cameralists  very  much 
as  a  treatise  on  the  logic  of  ethics  would  aflfect  the  typical 
modern  legislator.  This  is  not  to  say  that  they  were  on  a 
plane  altogether  remote  from  actual  application.  They  con- 
tain much,  on  the  contrary,  which  is  at  the  other  extreme  of 
the  tediously  commonplace;  for  example,  the  twenty-three 
fundamental  rules  for  obtaining  "means."'  As  a  whole, 
however,  they  are  emphatically  books  of  and  for  the  study 
rather  than  the  bureau,  and  it  is  not  surprising  that  they  failed 
to  make  an  impression  proportioned  to  their  intrinsic  worth. 
As  a  general  proposition,  no  one  engaged  directly  in  any  division 
of  the  activities  which  Zincke  discusses  could  fail  to  be  so  well 
informed,  or  to  have  such  sources  of  information  among  his 
ass(;ciates  in  the  occupation,  that  the  author's  treatment  of  his 
interests  would  seem  superfluous.  On  the  other  hand,  to 
most  of  the  scholars  of  the  time  Cameral-Wissenschaft  was  as 
much  of  an  impertinence  as  sociology  has  seemed  to  the  majority 
of  the  .same  cla.ss  during  the  past  quarter-century.  In  the 
Vorbericht  to  Theil  II  Zincke  seems  partly  aware  of  this  situa- 
tion, and  to  choose  his  course  in  spite  of  it.'  He  declares  that 
he  is  not  writing  for  the  great  masters  in  their  subjects,  whose 
pupil  he  is  willing  to  call  himself,  nor  for  those  who  want  a 
hanrlbook  of  technical  practice,  still  less  for  those  self-satisfied 
people  who  imagine  that  these  subjects  are  too  trivial  for  their 
superior  mine's.  He  believes  that  the  book  will  be  of  use  to 
the  students  who  have  listened  to  his  lectures  for  twenty  years, 
and  he  also  expresses  the  hope  that  German  rulers, /row  whom 
ministers  who  disagree  with  the  author  do  not  contrive  to  keep 

«  I,  pp.  172  ff.  Vide  the  nine  rules  on  the  relations  of  occupations  to 
one  another  (I,  205);  the  four  fundamental  rules  for  Policey  (I,  p.  266); 
etc.  On  the  other  hand,  the  schedule  of  38  "police  questions"  (I,  p.  266) 
is  in  spirit  and  in  detail  quite  typical  of  the  hesX.  practical  standards  of 
the  system. 

'  Kspecially  pp.  xiii  fT. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ZINXKE  259 

tlte  book  (sicf)  will  find  in  it  something  to  approve  and  apply. 
Lastly,  he  speaks  as  though  he  had  definite  expectations  that 
his  work  would  be  used  as  a  text  by  tutors  charged  with  the 
education  of  young  princes. 

To  sum  up  the  case  for  Zincke,  one  can  hardly  study  the 
cameralistic  sources  without  astonishment  that  this  writer 
has  been  allowed  to  fall  into  such  an  inconspicuous  place  in 
the  history  of  German  social  science.  His  merit  is  far  above 
his  reputation.  His  more  solid  qualities  have  been  obscured 
by  the  more  brilliant  and  audacious  Justi.  There  is  plenty 
of  internal  evidence  in  the  books  of  the  latter  that  he  was  both 
jealous  and  afraid  of  Zincke.  He  might  well  have  been. 
With  all  his  versatility,  his  scholarship  was  not  of  an  order  to 
gain  by  critical  comparison  with  that  of  his  less  showy  and 
apparently  less  successful  contemporary.  Stieda  has  evidently 
reached  a  somewhat  similar  estimate.  He  is  well  within  bounds 
when  he  concludes  (p.  31): 

Under  all  the  circumstances  Zincke  seems  to  have  been  a  very 
respectable  thinker.  To  be  sure  he  sticks  too  closely,  on  the  one 
hand,  to  details  of  the  particular  gainful  occupations,  and  as  con- 
trasted with  the  general  principles  of  national  economy  he  excessively 
emphasizes  Praxis.  Nevertheless,  what  he  was  after  was  a  study  of 
economic  relations,  and  he  wanted  it  to  be  systematic  and  thorough. 
It  would  surely  have  been  to  the  advantage  of  the  University  of  Leip- 
zig, if  instead  of  allowing  his  migration  it  had  put  him  in  a  professor- 
ship of  the  economic  sciences,  which  he  would  certainly  have  occupied 
with  all  zeal. 

In  closing  his  discussion  of  the  economic  policy  of  Frederick 
the  Great,  Roscher  very  aptly  remarks: 

Whoever  would  characterize  a  great  general  must  use,  for  com- 
pleting the  picture,  proportionate  details  about  the  qualities  of  his 
most  important  subordinates.  Hence  something  must  be  said  about 
a  group  of  writers  of  the  second  and  third  rank 

For  the  same  reason,  in  order  properly  to  shade  our  picture 


26o  THE  CAMERALISTS 

of  cameralism  in  general,  we  must  mention  briefly  some  of 
the  less  important  writers  at  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury. First  in  order,  we  may  name  Kottencamp.'  The  most 
obvious  fact  about  this  mere  tract  of  sixty-four  pages  is  that 
it  is  a  eulogy  of  Frederick  the  Great,  from  the  point  of  view 
of  a  military  man,  to  be  classed  with  the  similar  eulogy  of 
Frederick's  father,  by  Ludewig,  speaking  as  an  academician. 
In  the  second  place,  the  tract  is  notable  as  an  apology  for  the 
benevolent  despot  in  contrast  with  the  Machiavellian  type  of 
prince.  Without  asking  whether  Kottencamp  understood 
Machiavelli,  we  find  in  him  a  very  graphic  sketch  of  the  type 
of  government  which  cameralistic  theory  presupposed."  If 
we  were  confined  to  this  piece  of  evidence,  the  picture  of  the 
cameralistic  regime  which  could  be  reconstructed  from  it  would 
exactly  correspond  in  tone  with  the  account  we  have  thus  far 
given;  and  there  would  be  more  than  a  suggestion  of  the  main 
divisions  of  technical  detail  which  are  presented  by  the  text- 

«  Kurtzer  Abriss  und  wahres  Ebenbild  eines  grossen  Fiirsten  und 
erhabenen  Geistes.  Worinnen  die  allgemeinen  Grundlehren  der  gesunden. 
Staatskunst  in  natiirlicher  Ordnung  abgehandell,  und  mil  den  neuesten 
Exempeln  der  Europdischen  Geschichte  erldutert  seyn.  Nebst  einigen 
Anmerkungen  iiber  die  Lehrsdtze  Machiavels  von  der  Regierungskunst 
eines  Fiirsten,  ver/asset  und  erUworfen  von  Christian  Friedrich  Kotten- 
camp, Auditeur  bey  dem  Konigl.  Preussis.  hochldbl.  Wallravischen 
Pionnier-Regitnenle.  .  .  .  1747. 

»  His  subtitles  are:  "I.  Von  den  verschiedenen  Gattungcn,  und  der 
Gemiiths-Art  der  Fiirsten;"  "II.  Von  der  verschiedenen  Fahigkeit  und 
Artep  des  Verstandes  regierender  Fiirsten;"  "III.  Von  der  Gerechtig- 
keit,  wie,  auf  welche  weise,  und  wie  weit  souveraine  Fiirsten  solche  gegen 
ihre  Nachbaren  und  Unterthanen  beobachten  miissen;"  "IV.  Wie  ein 
Fijrst  seinen  Staat  erhalten  und  gross  werden  konne;"  "V.  Von  dem 
Staatsinteresse,  und  der  Verbindlichkeit  der  Fiirsten  in  Betracht  des- 
selben;"  "VI.  Von  dem  Gliicke,  und  dem  Einflusse  desselben  in  die 
Handlungen,  und  Staatsgeschafte  der  Fursten;"  "VII.  Ursachen, 
wodurch  die  Reiche  und  Staaten  verfallen,  und  die  Fiirstenlichen  Hauser 
zu  Grunde  gehen." 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ZINCKE  261 

writers  with  whom  we  are  chiefly  concerned.  Kottencamp 
undertakes  to  show  that  the  principles  of  true  statemanship 
are  equally  distant  from  Machiavellianism  on  the  one  hand 
and  from  theological  ethics  on  the  other.  Dismissing  at  once 
the  assumption  that  government  can  be  conducted  on  a  prayer- 
meeting  basis,  he  declares  that  while  "honor,  uprightness, 
and  virtue  in  general  must  everywhere  be  bound  together  with 
sound  politics,"  yet  self-preservation,  "which  is  the  natural 
impulse  of  all  men,"  is  "the  plumb-line  to  which  all  doctrines 
of  statecraft  must  conform,"  and  "the  actual  interests  of  the 
state  must  therefore  be  placed  at  the  foundation  of  all  civic 
maxims."  "If  the  precepts  of  state  adopted  by  cabinets  often 
seem  severe,  and  in  outward  appearance  to  insult  virtue,  they 
are  nevertheless  justified  by  grim  necessity  in  this  imperfect 
human  life."  It  is  easy  to  read  between  the  lines  of  this  essay 
unrecognized  major  premises  which  would  in  less  than  a 
century  dictate  revolutionary  conclusions.  In  form  the  mono- 
graph rests  without  question  upon  the  divine-right  presupposi- 
tion. In  fact,  princes  are  judged  and  classified  by  strictly 
functional  standards.^  We  shall  find  cumulative  evidence  of 
this  conflict  between  old  and  new  standards  of  value  in  Justi 
and  Sonnenfels.  Men  at  this  time  still  expressed  their  belief  in 
princes  in  terms  of  divine  right.  They  were  already  uncon- 
sciously learning  to  form  their  working  estimates  of  princes 
by  the  criterion  of  their  benefit  or  injury  to  their  states.  Kot- 
tencamp formulates  the  first  great  commandment  of  statecraft 
in  the  precept:  "Seek  to  maintain  thyself  and  thy  state,  and 
to  promote  the  best  good  of  thy  state."'  While  the  first  clause 
was  still  paramount  both  in  political  policy  and  in  political 

'E.g.,  p.  19.  Still  more  distinctly,  p.  44,  "Das  wahre  Staats- 
interesse  besteht  in  den  Nutzen,  ....  aber  ....  dieser  Nutze  .... 
konne  von  der  Gerechtigkeit  auf  keine  Weise  getrennt  werden." 

«  "  Suche  dich  und  deinen  Staat  zu  erhalten,  und  deines  Staats  Beste 
cu  beforden"  (p.  19). 


262  THE  CAMERALISTS 

I)hiloso[)hy,  the  great  dynamic  fact  in  this  period  was  the 
gathering  force  of  the  second  clause.  Rulers  and  their  advisers 
regarded  it  as  the  formula  of  a  gratifying  incident  of  absolutism. 
In  the  retn)spect  we  can  see  that  it  was  a  revolutionary  prin- 
ciple, destined  to  supplant  absolutism. 

The  prevailing  assumption  of  the  universal  enmity  of  states 
is  presented  in  the  essay  as  a  matter  of  course.  "To  tell  the 
truth,  it  is  with  peoples  and  states  as  with  the  animal  kingdom. 
The  stronger  overcome  the  weak,  and  grow  still  stronger  by 
devouring  them"  (p.  20).  Therefore,  "a  prince  never  trans- 
gresses justice  if  he  only  restrains  his  desire  to  oppress  others 
and  to  appropriate  their  powers;  and  on  the  other  hand  has 
only  the  purpose  of  his  own  preservation  in  all  undertakings 
against  his  neighbors"  (p.  30). 

Turning  to  principles  of  government  Kottencamp  bases 
political  wisdom  on  three  "maxims":  f^fy 

A  prince  must  rule  his  realfn  according  to  its  own  genius  and 
the  disposition  [GemiUhsart]  of  the  people,  and  must  understand 
how  to  stop  the  sources  of  all  internal  unrest  and  disturbance  (p.  33). 

Then  internal  concord  provided  for,  the  prince  has  the 
comparatively  easy  task  of  dealing  with  foreigners.  Therefore, 
second : 

A  prince  must  always  put  himself  in  such  a  condition  as  com- 
pared with  his  neighbor  that  he  is  at  least  his  equal  in  resources  and 
power,  or,  if  this  is  imfx)ssible,  that  the  inequality  may  be  offset  by 
alliances  and  other  arrangements,  so  that  he  need  not  fear  destruction 
or  subjugation  by  his  neighbor  (p.  34). 

In  the  thirrl  place,  a  prince  who  would  provide  against  his  own 
fall  and  the  destruction  of  his  realm,  must  in  his  prosperity  moderate 
his  desires  and  not  covet  more  than  he  would  be  able  in  a  natural 
manner  to  protect  and  permanently  retain  (p.  37). 

The  thesis  of  the  second  part  of  the  same  chapter  (iv),  on 
the  question,  How  may  a  prince  become  great  ?  is: 

The  true  greatness  of  princes  is  inseparable  from  the  prosperity 
and  growth  of  the  fortune  and  welfare  of  their  lands  (p.  39). 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ZINXKE  263 

To  modern  republicans  such  propositions  are  platitudes. 
Their  historical  importance  consists  in  their  demonstration 
that  the  times  were  generating  essentially  republican  cnerj^ics 
while  the  absolutistic  regime  was  superficially  un(|ucsti(jned. 

Again,  Kottencamp  voices  a  deeper  political  philosophy, 
rather  than  the  creed  of  a  governing  class,  when  he  defines  the 
interest  of  the  state: 

The  interest  of  the  state  ....  is  whatever  belongs  to  the  growth, 
prosperity,  and  welfare  of  a  state  (p.  43). 

To  be  sure,  the  Germans  had  not  yet  fairly  entered  upon 
that  stage  of  their  political  education  in  which  a  thoroughly 
rational  content  was  to  be  given  to  the  concepts  "gn^wth," 
"prosperity,"  "welfare,"  and  the  like.  The  meaning  of 
these  forms  of  expression  may  easily  be  exaggerated.  They 
may  not  be  taken  to  mean  all  that  they  would  suggest  to  modern 
men.  We  argue  from  them  here  no  more  than  that  men  were 
well  on  their  way  toward  abandoning  the  will  of  the  prince 
as  the  last  norm  of  political  desirability.  They  were  learning 
to  set  up  more  essential  popular  values  as  the  valid  ends  of 
civic  action. 

A  second  minor  writer  of  this  period  is  von  Loen.'  Roscher 
says: 

The  extent  to  which  at  this  period  (1747)  popular  feeling  had 
adjusted  itself  to  police  guardianship  may  be  seen  from  M.  v.  Locn's 
ErUwurj  einer  Siaatskunst,  worin  die  naliirlichsten  Millcl  entdeckt 
werden,  ein  Land  machtig,  reich  und  glucklich  zu  machen  (1747, 
III.  Aufl.,  1751).  The  author  recommends  freedom  as  the  first 
means  of  promoting  population,  "this  essential  ground  of  all  the 
power  of  the  prince  and  happiness  of  the  state."  Freedom  is  "the 
true  happiness  of  a  state,  the  most  precious  possession  of  man,  a 
part  of  his  life.  He  cannot  be  robbed  of  it  without  violation  of 
justice  and  violence  to  nature"  (pp.  3  ff).    Yet  according  to  von  Loen 

'  As  I  have  been  unable  to  secure  copies  of  his  books,  this  reference 
is  wholly  a  quotation  from  Roscher  (p.  441). 


264  THE  CAMERALISTS 

much  constraint  Is  tcinsistefit  With  this  freedom.  Tradespeople, 
for  example,  "should  hot  be  alldwed  to  bring  ifiy  foreign  wares  into 
the  country  which  are  unnecessary  and  useless,  and  on  the  other 
hand  drive  money  out  of  the  country."  The  manufacture  of  too 
much  gold  and  silver  and  of  too  much  liquor  should  be  forbidden; 
likewise  the  founding  of  too  many  printing  establishments,  because 
"most  books  are  good  for  nothing,  but  merely  make  the  common 
people  discontented,  turbulent,  and  confused"  (pp.  6  ff.).  A  mar- 
riage bureau  should  forbid  marriages  "whenever  the  parties  are  not 
suited  to  each  other"  (p.  23).  There  should  be  sumptuary  laws 
regulating  the  costumes  of  the  various  social  strata  (p.  154). 

Von  Loen  died  in  1776.  His  best-known  book  is  the  novel, 
Graf  Rivera,  oder  der  ehrliche  Mann  am  Hoje:  Its  motive  was  the 
improvement  of  life  at  courts. 

The  third  writer  to  be  recalled  in  this  connection  is  Philippi.* 
This  exponent  of  Prussian  civic  ideas  is  of  the  same  general 
class  and  type  with  Kottencamp.  He  adds  nothing  to  the 
theory  of  cameralism,  but  he  is  good  evidence  of  the  kind  of 
commonplaces  which  had  become  orthodox  tradition  in  the 
quasi-absolutistic  states  of  which  cameralism  was  the  theory. 
Philipjn's  books  contain  not  a  little  material  which  goes  much 
farther  than  he  imagined  in  throwing  light  upon  details  of 
political  opinion  as  held  in  Germany  at  this  time.  Our  limits 
permit  only  a  few  indications  of  points  in  his  argument.  The 
fundamental  proposition  is: 

Everyone  is  hound  to  take  care  for  the  improvement  of  his  tem- 
poral circumstances  and  princes  especially  for  the  righteous  aggran- 
dizement of  their  slates.' 

The  essay  calmly  takes  for  granted  that  the  temporal  happi- 

'  Die  wahren  Mittel  zur  Vergrosserung  eines  Stoats,  1 7 53.  (166  pp. ) 
This  essay  is  dedicated  to  Frederick  II  of  Prussia.  Der  vergrosserte 
Staal,   von  Johann   Albrcrht   Philippi,    Konigl.    Preussischen  Auditeur 

Finckischen    Rf^siments i7.S9-     (.372    pp)     Dedicated    to    the 

Prince  of  Prussia. 

'  Die  wahren  Mittel,  chap.  i. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  ZINCKE  265 

ness  of  subjects  depends  more  upon  providential  care  by  the 
prince  than  upon  any  otiier  human  means,  and  it  is  therefore 
primarily  a  discussion  of  this  cardinal  factor.  "The  first 
means  of  blessing  and  aggrandizing  a  state  is  a  good  prince." 
It  is  also  presupposed  that  there  is  divine  guarantee  of  good 
princes  in  hereditary  succession,  while  there  is  no  such  guaran- 
tee in  an  elective  monarchy.  Next  to  a  good  prince,  true  and 
wise  counselors  and  administrators  promote  the  aggrandize- 
ment of  a  state  (chap.  ii).  Chap,  iii  begins  with  a  typical 
formula  of  the  factor  of  population,  viz.: 

The  great  author  of  the  anii-Machiavelli  says  with  the  greatest 
justice:  "He  is  not  the  greatest  and  most  eminent  who  possesses 
the  most  land.  If  he  were,  many  an  owner  of  agricultural  land  would 
outrank  a  counselor  of  state,  but  on  the  contrary,  we  may  say  with 
certainty  that  he  is  the  richest  prince  who  has  unlimited  sovereignty 
over  the  most  subjects."  Accordingly,  for  the  aggrandizement 
of  a  state,  all  legitimate  means  must  be  used  to  maintain  a  constant 
increase  of  the  popualtion.' 

Next  in  importance  for  upbuilding  a  state  is  the  maintenance 
of  armies  (chap,  iv);  after  these  essentials,  important  means 
are  freedom  of  conscience  (chap,  v),  freedom  in  gainful  occu- 
pations {Handel  und  Wandel),  except  possibly  to  the  Jews 
(chap,  vi),  promotion  of  commerce  through  promotion  of 
agriculture  (chap,  vii).'  The  remaining  chapters  on  taxation 
(chap,  viii),  the  judiciary  (chap,  ix),  the  treasury  (chap,  x), 
the  improvement  of  higher  and  lower  schools  (chap,  xi),  and 
Policey  (chap,  xii)  contain  nothing  which  calls  for  comment. 

The  second  of  the  essays  mentioned  is  merely  a  variation 

'  Here  and  elsewhere  Philippi  cites  von  Loen  as  conclusive  authority. 

.»  This  part  of  the  argument  corroborates  our  generalization  that  the 
traditional  accounts  of  this  mercantilist  theory  are  largely  fabulous. 
Vide  p.  14.  Philippi  quotes  with  approval  a  remark  attributed  to  Pliny: 
"  The  more  diversified  crops  a  land  has,  the  greater  its  happiness  and 
wealth." 


266  THE  CAMERALISTS 

of  the  first.'  The  date  of  the  Preface  is  May  21,  1759. 
Although,  as  it  proved,  the  third  Silesian  war  was  to  drag  along 
nearly  four  years  more,  this  Prussian  militarist  wrote  in  an 
exultant  tone.  The  second  essay  may  be  called  an  I-told-you- 
so  version  of  the  first.  The  chapters  are  the  same  in  number 
as  in  the  earlier  essay  with  the  exception  of  an  added  thirteenth 
in  the  later,  "Gedanken  fiber  die  Kameral-  und  Finanz-Wis- 
senschaft;"  they  treat  of  the  same  topics;  but  now  the  point  of 
view  is  no  longer  prospective,  it  is  retrospective.  The  recom- 
mended means  for  aggrandizing  a  state  had  been  used  a  half- 
dozen  years  longer  by  the  great  Frederick,  and  Prussia  was 
now  the  already  aggrandized  state.  This  view  of  the  situation 
furnishes  the  occasion  for  elaboration  of  the  eulogy  upon  Fred- 
erick's regime,  which  had  been  more  moderate  in  the  earlier 
essay.  At  the  same  time,  there  is  reason  for  the  suspicion  that 
this  confident  tone  was  merely  a  rhetorical  device.  The 
author  wanted  to  do  his  part  toward  keeping  up  the  courage 
and  stimulating  the  ardor  of  his  fellow-Prussians.  Whether 
the  essay  was  merely  a  specimen  of  the  "  point- with-pride" 
type  of  campaign  literature,  in  which  the  pride  is  often  in 
inverse  ratio  with  its  real  occasion,  or  a  genuine  expression  of 
belief  about  the  assured  results  of  Frederick's  rule,  it  has  the 
same  value  for  our  purposes.  It  is  the  credo  of  a  mediocre 
man,  in  which  we  find  such  a  man's  reflection  of  the  doctrines 
taught  by  more  eminent  authorities. 

'  I  have  used  both  a  separately  bound  copy  of  the  first,  and  a  copy 
In  the  same  covers  with  the  second.  It  should  be  added,  however,  that 
the  binding,  though  not  very  recent,  is  apparently  of  a  much  later  date 
than  the  publication. 


CHAPTER  XII 
THE  CAMERALISTICS  OF  DARJES 

Roscher  speaks  of  Darjes  as  "undoubtedly  the  most  impor- 
tant of  the  cameralistic  professors  patronized  by  Frederick  the 
Great"  (p.  419). 

Like  many  Germans  at  this  period  who  afterward  gained 
eminence  in  other  spheres,  Joachim  Georg  Darjes  (17 14-91) 
devoted  a  considerable  portion  of  his  attention  as  a  university 
student  to  theology.  He  even  preached  a  short  time  after 
gaining  his  Master's  degree.  Turning,  however,  to  juris- 
prudence he  received  the  degree  of  Dr.  der  Rechte  (1739), 
offered  courses  on  the  Institutes  and  Pandects,  and  in  1744 
was  made  ordentlicher  Professor  der  Moral  und  Politik,  with 
the  title  Ho/rath.  According  to  Richter  {All.  d.  Bib.,  in  he.) 
Darjes'  academic  success  was  so  great  that  in  his  twenty-seven 
years  at  Jena,  he  had  more  than  ten  thousand  hearers.  On 
the  invitation  of  Frederick  the  Great,  he  migrated  (1763)  to 
Frankfurt  a.  O,  as  Konigl.  preuss.  Geheimrath  und  ordentlicher 
Professor  der  Rechte.  Here  he  founded  the  Konigliche  Gelehrte 
Gesellschaft.  He  did  not,  however,  acquire  the  same  influence 
as  a  university  lecturer  which  he  had  enjoyed  at  Jena.  He 
became  (1772)  Direktor  of  the  university,  Ordinarius  of  the 
law  faculty,  and  the  ranking  professor  of  law.'  Richter  says: 
"Darjes  was  of  great  service  to  the  cameral  sciences  by 
introducing  them  into  university  instruction."  (Richter 
»  Of  his  numerous  writings  (scheduled  in  Meusel's  Lexicon),  we 
may  name,  in  addition  to  the  book  to  be  discussed  below:  FJementa 
metaphysica,  1743;  Institutiones  juris prudenliae  universalis,  17^^', 
Philosophische  N  ehenstunden,  1749-52;  Erste  Grunde  der  philosophise  he  i 
SiUenlehre,  1750;  Via  ad  Veritatem,  1758;  Discurs  iiher  Natur-  uni'. 
Volkerrecht,  1762;  Einleitung  in  des  Freyherrn  von  Bielefeld  Lehr- 
be griff  der  Staatsklugheit,  1764  (on  J.  F.  von  Bielfeld  {sic\  vide  Roscher, 
pp.  426  ff.). 

267 


268  THE  CAMERALISTS 

doubtless  meant  at  Jena.)  "As  an  author  Darjes  does  not 
stand  particularly  high.  He  lacked  thoroughness,  precision, 
and  talent  for  clear  presentation."' 

This  estimate  by  Richter  is  by  no  means  to  be  accepted  as 
final.  Indeed,  if  we  recall  Zincke  for  the  sake  of  comparison, 
we  experience  a  deep  sense  of  relief  in  passing  from  his  much 
less  perspicuous,  if  more  profound  and  comprehensive  books, 
to  Darjes'  clear  and  intelligent  outline  of  cameralistics.' 
Roscher  further  says  (p.  419): 

Darjes  was  an  eminent  pupil  of  WolflF,  who  wanted  jurisprudence, 
medicine,  Wirthschajtslehre,  etc.,  to  prevail  only  as  applied  phi- 
losophy, but  on  account  of  his  severely  demonstrative  method  of 
exposition  J.  J.  Moser  contemptuously  labeled  him  "ModephUosoph." 
With  respect  to  the  fundamental  concepts  of  national  economics 
Darjes  had  leamed  much  more  from  Hume  than  the  majority  of 
his  contemporaries  in  Germany. 

Roscher  cites  only  the  second  edition  of  the  Erste  Grunde, 
published  after  the  author  had  moved  from  Jena  to  Frankfurt. 3 
In  his  estimate  of  Darjes'  rank  Roscher  evidently  did  not 
include  Justi  in  the  group  of  "Frederick's  professors  of  came- 
ralistics."  He  doubtless  classed  Justi  as  an  administrator  or 
author,  rather  than  as  a  professor. 

'  Vide  Stieda,  pp.  52  and  78. 

»  Erste  Grunde  der  Cameral-Wissenschaften,  darinnen  die  Haupt- 
Theile  so  wohl  der  Oeconomie  als  auch  der  Pblicey  und  besondern  Cameral- 
Wissenschaft  in  ihrer  naturlichen  VerknUpfung,  zum  Cebrauch  seiner 
academischen  Furlesung  entworfen  von  Joachim  Ceorg  Darjes,  Hoch- 
fiirstl.  Sachsen-  Weimar-  und  Eisenachischen  Hof-Ralhe,  der  Philosophie 
und  beyder  Rechten  Doctor,  wie  auch  der  Sitten-Lehre  und  Staats-Klugheit 
ordentlichen  Professor  zu  Jena,  des  Senals  der  Churfurstl.  Maynz.  A  ka- 
demie  niUzlicher  Wissenschaften  ordentlichem  Beysitzer,  der  Jenaischen 
Akademie  x.  d.  Z.  Pro-Rector  und  der  Philosophise  hen  FacultiU  Decano. 
....  1756.     (Pp.  664,  exclusive  of  the  Index,  which  fills  54  pages.) 

3  All  references  in  this  chapter  are  to  the  first  edition.  I  have  not 
seen  the  second. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  DARJES  269 

Darjes'  own  account  of  the  origin  of  his  book,  as  contained 
in  the  Vorrede,  is  substantially  this:  He  says  that  from  boy- 
hood he  had  been  eager  to  search  into  the  secrets  of  nature, 
to  find  out  how  natural  forces  work,  and  thus  to  learn  what 
must  be  done  when  the  attempt  is  made  to  imitate  nature  by 
art.  Following  this  impulse,  he  found  frequent  occasions, 
in  the  course  of  lectures  on  other  subjects,  especially  morals 
and  politics,  to  introduce  practical  reflections  upon  rural  and 
urban  management.  His  hearers  recognized  the  importance 
of  such  considerations,  and  at  length  a  petition  came  from 
them  for  a  separate  course  on  the  subject. 

In  adopting  the  suggestion,  Darjes  selected  as  his  guide, 
first,  Dithmar's  Einleitung.  He  pronounces  the  book  admi- 
rable [schon],  but  finds  it  somewhat  too  "remote"  from  the 
aspects  of  the  subjects  which  he  wants  to  treat.  That  is,  he 
regards  it  as  not  sufficiently  concrete.  "It  describes  things 
which  occur  in  all  departments  of  these  activities  [i.  e.,  Wirth- 
schqfi,  Policey,  Cammer],  but  he  does  not  explain  how  they 
are  to  be  carried  out  and  improved."  Then  followed  "the 
excellent  work  which  bears  the  title,  KlugJieii  zu  leben  utid  zu 
herrschen."^     He  says: 

I  have  more  than  once  lectured  with  profit  upon  this  work,  and 
I  doubt  if  anyone  can  read  it  attentively  without  becoming  more 
useful.  It  lacks  nothing  except  more  specific  explanation  of  the 
grounds  on  which  the  activities  of  rural  and  civic  management  must 
be  judged. 

Darjes  says  that  he  had  also  several  times  used  Schroder's 
Fiirstliche  Schatz-  und  Rent-Cammer,'  and  Seckendorff's 
Fiirsten-Slaat,^  as  the  basis  of  his  lectures,  but  at  length  he 
was  prevailed  upon  by  his  students  and  the  publishers  to  print 
his  own  ideas  in  systematic  form. 

>  Rohr's  digest  seems  to  have  had  an  influence  out  of  proportion  to 
its  author's  merit.     Vide  above,  p.  190. 

»  Vide  above,  pp.  135  ff.  3  Vide  above,  pp.  61  ff. 


2  70  THE  CAMERALISTS 

The  author's  views  of  the  instruction  in  cameralistic  sub- 
jects most  a|)|)n)j)riate  to  universities,  and  consequently  to  be 
introduced  by  such  a  book,  call  for  treatment  midway  between 
abstract  methodology  on  the  one  hand  and  details  of  admin- 
istrative routine  on  the  other.  He  points  out  very  clearly  that 
it  would  be  an  endless  task  to  describe  in  dftail  each  of  the 
separate  processes  that  occur  in  the  different  divisions  of 
management.  He  is  equally  clear  in  his  judgment  that  such 
detailc'fl  description  would  be  undesirable  if  possible.  He 
declares  that  many  managerial  processes  must  be  compre- 
henrled  under  a  common  idea;  that  the  important  thing  is  to 
understand  this  fundamental  idea,  in  a  .single  tyf)ical  case,  and 
then  anyone  cajjable  of  independent  thinking  can  find  for 
himself  the  relation  of  other  cases  to  the  same  idea.  He  also 
draws  a  very  definite  distinction  between  the  science  of  manage- 
ment and  actual  management  itself,  and  he  adds: 

Those  who  carry  out  operations  are  often  incajaablc  of  compre- 
hending the  science  fundamental  to  the  operations.  They  simply 
do  what  they  art*  told,  and  their  reasons  for  doing  it  do  not  extend 
beyond  the  fact  that  they  are  told.  Those  who  have  charge  of 
of>eration.s,  however,  must  necessarily  understand  the  science  of  the 
same. 

.Accordingly,  Darjes  calls  his  book  "philosophical  intro- 
duction to  Wirlhschaff'  and  he  ex[)lains  that  his  purpose  is: 
to  dwell  on  the  connection  of  tiuths  which  will  make  us  capable  of 
ju  Iging  all  questions  that  would  arise  in  practice,  on  their  real 
grounds,  and  to  form  clear  and  intelligible  ideas  of  everything  which 

occurs  in  Wirthachajt The  science   of    Wirthschajl  should 

make  us  ca]>able  of  making  an  orderly  Wirthschajl  possible  where 
it  has  hitherto  lx*en  imfwssible,  and  of  guiding  the  same  to  the 
advantage  of  human  .society.  If  we  add  that  wisdom  has  its  purpose 
in  promotion  of  the  welfare  of  men,  and  second,  that  a  great  part  of 
the  welfare  of  the  state  is  founded  in  an  orderly  Wirthschajl,  we  have 
the  motives  for  applying  the  science  of  Wirthschajl  to  the  state; 
vi/..,  first,  to  derive  from  the  constitution  of  the  state  those  means 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  DARJES  271 

by  which  the  establishment  of  an  orderly  Wirthschaft  in  it  is  pos- 
sible; second,  to  describe  those  means  through  which  an  orderly 
Wirthschaft  will  be  capable  of  promoting  the  prosperity  of  the  state. 
The  first  of  these  purposes  is  treated  in  the  first  and  second  parts 
of  this  book,  the  second  in  the  third  part,  the  third  in  the  fourth 
part. 

Darjes  concludes  with  the  specification : 

The  source  from  which  I  have  drawn  the  special  ideas  is  expe- 
rience. Hence  I  may  rightfully  demand  that  the  ideas  be  judged 
not  in  accordance  with  the  conceptions  which  others  have  constructed, 
but  in  accordance  with  experience.  That  which  experience  teaches 
us  I  have  combined  with  general  truths,  partly  in  order  to  establish 
a  correlation,  partly  to  confirm  rules,  the  observance  of  which  will 
conduct  us  securely  toward  attainment  of  the  end  which  we  have 
proposed. 

As  we  have  intimated  before,^  this  appeal  to  experience, 
particularly  in  the  sense  of  personal  observation,  may  be 
taken  as  one  of  the  authentic  finding  marks  of  the  cameralists. 
Beginning  with  Osse,  we  find  increasingly  evident  tendencies 
to  break  away  from  mere  repetition  of  tradition  and  precedent, 
and  to  consider  state  policy  as  means  to  certain  rather  clearly 
defined  ends  not  contained  in  conventional  definitions.  With 
exceptions,  and  with  varying  degrees  of  emphasis  on  this  phase 
of  their  reasoning,  the  men  whom  we  recognize  as  cameralists 
have  exhibited  this  trait.  They  were  not  equally  aware  of  the 
importance  which  they  actually  assigned  to  the  empirical 
element  in  their  systems.  Darjes  is  notable,  however,  as  one 
of  the  most  outspoken  in  this  respect. 

But  we  must  judge  Darjes  still  more  specifically.  The 
succession  of  cameralists  furnishes  several  marked  cases  to 
point  the  moral  that  reputation  is  not  always  in  accordance 
with  an  objective  measure  of  merit.  If  we  were  to  make  out 
from  the  type  of  evidence  now  under  review  the  most  exact 

<  Vide  p.  4  et  passim. 


272  THE  CAMERALISTS 

estimate  possible  of  the  growth  of  scientific  consciousness 
among  the  cameralists,  the  most  significant  signs  would  by  no 
means  always  be  found  in  those  writers  to  whom  tradition, 
as  we  have  it,  has  awarded  the  most  conspicuous  place,  Darjes 
is  one  of  the  most  notable  cases  in  point.  In  spite  of  the 
phrase  quoted  above,*  readers  of  Roscher  who  do  not  compare 
the  authors  discussed  will  hardly  gain  the  impression  that 
Darjes  marks  a  distinct  stadium  in  the  development  of  German 
economic  insight.  My  own  judgment  is  that  the  Erste  Griinde 
contains  the  most  striking  evidence  to  be  found  in  the  came- 
ralists thus  far  reviewed,  that  attention  was  turning  toward 
economic  relations  conceived  approximately  as  in  Adam 
Smith's  formulation  of  economic  problems.  A  casual  read- 
ing of  Darjes*  book  would  detect  in  it  merely  insignificant 
variations  in  form  and  content  from  the  analysis  and 
treatment  of  previous  cameralists.  More  careful  scrutiny 
discovers  such  differences  of  precision  and  clearness  in  the 
perception  of  relations,  that  one  feels  bound  to  credit  Darjes 
with  having  advanced  a  long  distance  toward  the  standpoint 
of  positive  science.  Not  only  is  his  style  more  direct  and 
business-like  than  that  of  most  of  his  class,  but  clear  and 
objective  thinking  furnishes  a  substantial  content  for  his 
language.  Nor  is  progressiveness  the  only  trait  for  which 
Darjes  is  notable.  His  epitome  of  the  aims  and  outlook  of 
cameralism  is  remarkably  concise  and  comprehensive.  No 
single  writer  in  the  cameralistic  succession  gives  a  brief  account 
of  the  scope  and  purpose  of  their  discipline  which  better 
reflects  the  genius  of  the  whole  movement. 

Although  it  may  not  be  immediately  apparent  that  it  is 
more  than  mere  ref)etition  of  ideas  which  had  become  stock 
pro[>ertics  among  the  cameralists,  we  should  leave  a  serious 
gap  in  our  outline  of  the  development  of  the  subject,  if  we 
failed  to  present,  in  a  faithful  rendering  of  his  own  words, 

»  Vide  p.  267. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  DARJES  273 

a  digest  of  Darjes'  introduction.  He  first  pays  his  respects  to 
three  objections,  already  familiar  to  us,  urged  by  his  contempo- 
raries against  Cameralwissenschaft  or  Haushaltungskunst,  viz. : 
first,  it  is  useless  to  try  to  make  a  science  out  of  these  subjects — 
they  must  be  learned  by  experience;  second,  whether  worth 
while  or  not,  a  science  of  these  subjects  is  impossible,  because 
so  many  contingencies  are  concerned,  which  cannot  be  foreseen, 
and  cannot  be  brought  under  general  conceptions;  third,  it 
is  beneath  the  dignity  of  scholars  to  concern  themselves  with 
subjects  which  are  matters  for  peasants  and  plain  citizens. 

In  answer  to  the  first  objection  Darjes  forcibly  maintains  the 
proposition  (§2):  "All  works  which  men  carry  on  for  the  advantage 
of  human  society  become  at  once,  if  not  perfect,  at  least  less  imperfect, 
if  they  are  ordered  and  controlled  by  those  who  have  a  science  and 
a  philosophical  understanding  of  these  works."  In  support  of  the 
proposition  he  urges,  in  a  spirit  much  more  of  the  future  than  of 
the  past:  "It  is  not  difficult  to  prove  this  theorem,  both  from  reason 
and  from  experience.  Reason  draws  this  conclusion:  a  thing  is 
perfect  when  it  is  arranged  according  to  its  nature  and  its  idea.  If 
then  we  are  not  to  expect  that  a  work  shall  be  perfected  by  blind 
chance,  its  completion  must  be  governed  by  those  who  are  skilled 
enough  to  investigate  the  nature  and  idea  of  this  work,  and  from 
this  understanding  distinctly  to  conclude  what  determines  the  per- 
fection and  imperfection  of  the  work.  This  is  the  idea  of  a  science 
and  of  a  philosophical  understanding.  Is  not  this  enough  to  furnish 
conclusive  support  for  the  thesis:  A  science  and  philosophical 
understanding  of  Cameralwissenschaft,  or  of  Haushaliungskunst, 
in  the  general  acceptance  of  that  word,  is  not  only  necessary,  but 
also  profitable?"' 

To  the  second  objection  Darjes  replies  (§4) :  "People  who  say  that 
Cameralwissenschaft  is  impossible  fall  back  on  a  prejudice  created  by 
those  who  have  proposed  untenable  conclusions  in  the  name  of  such 

'  In  expanding  the  argument,  Darjes  cites,  "for  the  benefit  of  those 
who  allow  themselves  to  be  influenced  more  by  celebrated  men  than  by 
reasons,  ....  die  vortrefliche  Streitschrift  .  .  .  .  de  excolendo  studio 
oeconomico."     (By  Rohr.     Vide  Roscher,  p.  378.) 


274  THE  CAMERALISTS 

science.  The  answer  must  be  given:  We  must  distinguish  the  grounds 
from  inferences  drawn  from  them.  The  alleged  grounds  are  not  to 
be  repudiated  completely.  In  the  first  place  it  is  true,  and  I  can 
prove  it  from  my  own  experience,  that  in  the  application  of  economic 
science  [dconomischen  Wissenschaft]  many  circumstances  emerge 
which  we  could  not  have  foreseen  and  which  demand  that  we  must,  if 
not  completely  abandon,  at  least  in  certain  particulars  modify  our 
plan.  Among  such  circumstances  I  count  the  various  states  of  mind 
and  capacities  of  men,  by  means  of  which  our  project  must  be  carried 
out;  the  various  sorts  of  soil,  determined  partly  by  their  inner  con- 
stitution, partly  by  their  location;  the  various  accidents  due  to 
weather  conditions,  etc.  In  the  second  place,  it  is  true  that  in  various 
writings  which  purport  to  treat  Haushaliungskunst^  scientifically, 
matters  are  included  which  partly  contradict  experience,  and  which 

partly,  although  they  may  be  possible,  are  impracticable 

This  does  not  prove  that  a  scientific  treatment  of  Haushaltungskunst 
and  the  camera!  sciences  is  impossible.  On  the  contrary,  the  fol- 
lowing causes  compel  rejection  of  such  a  conclusion:  first,  no  one 
who  acts  intelligently  rests  his  judgement  of  a  thing  upon  the  mis- 
takes of  those  who  represent  it.  Second,  mistakes  made  by  the 
intelligent  deserve  special  attention.  They  may  show  how  to 
discover  what  has  been  concealed,  and  how  to  make  that  which  was 
well  known  more  useful  and  applicable.  Who  can  make  use  of 
such  mistakes,  however,  but  he  who  already  has  a  science  of  such 
things  ?  Such  mistakes  then  are  no  proof  of  the  impossibility  of  the 
science  now  in  question.  They  may  rather  extend  and  complete 
the  science.  Third,  he  who  possesses  no  science  in  the  art  of 
management  (sic)*  must  conform  to  old  tradition,  and  it  will  be 
hard  for  him  to  adapt  himself  to  unexpected  and  altered  circum- 
stances.   If  things  go  well  in  such  a  crisis,  it  is  his  good  luck;   if 

•  The  substitution  within  a  few  lines  of  the  term,  "Haushaltungs- 
kunst" for  " dconomische  Wissenschaft"  is  strictly  typical.  The  clearest 
thinkers  in  the  group  did  not  get  their  objects  of  attention  so  definitely 
related  that  such  terms  as  these  received  a  precise  and  Invariable  content. 

» "  Wer  in  der  Haushaltungskunst  keine  Wissenschaft  hesittet." 
However  sane  the  fundamental  thinking  of  men  who  expressed  them- 
selves in  such  fashion,  they  were  outside  the  threshold  of  scientific 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  DARJES  275 

they  go  ill,  it  is  his  misfortune,  and  the  essence  of  it  is  his  own  stupid- 
ity. Whoever  on  the  other  hand  has  a  philosophical  understanding 
knows  how  these  unexpected  circumstances  are  to  be  considered, 
how  one  may  compare  them  with  the  nature  of  the  matter,  and  thus 
determine  the  general  theory  more  exactly,  and  thereby  make  it 
more  useful.  What  then  is  proved  by  this  addition  of  special  cir- 
cumstances? That  a  philosophical  science  of  Haushaltungskunst 
is  impossible  ?  It  rather  confirms  the  contrary,  and  the  necessity  of 
such  a  science.  This  may  then  be  concluded  that  without  experience 
a  philosophical  science  of  management  [eine  philosophische  Wissen- 
schaft  der  Haushaltungskunst]  cannot  be  made  sufficiently  definite 
and  applicable."  Darjes  assents  to  this  conclusion,  and  declares 
that  his  book  will  be  composed  accordingly. 

To  the  third  objection  the  answer  is  substantially  this:  The 
people  who  regard  attention  to  Haushaltungskunst  as  beneath  the 
dignity  of  the  learned,  appear  to  have  a  very  great  soul  but  a  very 
petty  mind.  They  call  themselves  learned,  but  do  not  know  what 
learning  [Gelehrsamkeit]  is.  They  have  perhaps  forgotten  that  the 
true  learning  is  that  which  proves  itself  profitable  among  men  and 
in  human  society,  and  that  the  eminence  of  this  learning  depends 
upon  the  quantity  of  this  advantage. »  To  put  it  briefly,  a  philoso- 
pher constructs  general  concepts,  he  infers  from  these  the  qualities 
of  things,  and  he  consequently  builds  up  a  correlation  of  truths  which 
represents  the  essentials  of  all  particulars  which  are  to  be  treated  in 
this  special  division  of  learning.  A  philosopher  will  then  become 
practical  if  he  determines  his  general  understanding  more  accurately 
through  history  and  experience,  and  this  is  the  natural  way  of  build- 
ing the  special  sciences. 

Thus  one  determines  one's  ideas  of  what  is  right  and  wrong 
through  the  customs  of  peoples  and  through  the  decisions  of  rulers, 

precision,  and  without  special  evidence  for  each  particular  case,  none 
of  their  propositions  are  to  be  interpreted  as  carrying  the  same  content 
which  their  terms  would  connote  in  later,  more  critical,  stages  of  social 
theory.  If  Richter  {vide  above,  p.  267)  meant  to  accuse  Darjes  of  lack  of 
precision  in  this  sense,  there  is  surely  no  reason  for  treating  him  as 
exceptional.  It  was  the  fashion  of  the  time. 
» Is  "pragmatism"  then  a  recent  discovery  1 


276  THE  CAMERALISTS 

and  one  becomes  a  jurist.  The  philosopher  determines  his  under- 
standing of  the  forces  of  things  through  learning  how  the  human 
body  is  put  together,  and  through  that  which  he  is  taught  by  expe- 
rience in  this  connection,  and  he  becomes  a  physician.  Another 
philosopher  determines  his  understanding  of  the  nature  and  workings 
of  things  through  that  which  experience  in  affairs  [^' Beschaftigungen^'] 
teaches  him,  and  he  becomes  a  manager.^  Why  now  is  the  dignity 
of  the  scholar  more  in  question  in  the  last  case  than  in  the  others  ? 
Is  he  who  constructs  a  science  of  preserving  and  extending  the 
riches  of  the  state  and  of  its  inhabitants  less  useful  to  the  state  than 
he  who  makes  himself  skilled  in  preserving  the  health  of  people, 
or  he  who  learns  how  to  decide  what  is  right  and  wrong  in  the 
quarrels  between  people?  The  external  welfare  of  men  is  related 
to  three  factors,  to  riches,  to  the  enjoyment  of  rights,  and  to  health. 
Each  who  is  zealous  so  to  determine  his  philosophy  that  it  may  be 
useful  in  promoting  any  of  these  purposes  (sic)  is  thereby  zealous 
in  promoting  the  welfare  of  human  society.  Is  it  not  a  clear  proof 
of  confusion  and  prejudice  if  one  looks  upon  one  of  these  factors 
as  opposed  to  the  dignity  of  a  scholar  ?  That  which  is  really  beneath 
the  dignity  of  a  scholar  is  to  deal  in  confused  ideas,  and  to  draw 
conclusions  from  prejudice. 

But,  continues  Darjes,  I  may  have  misunderstood  thek;  men. 
Perhaps  they  merely  mean  that  plowing,  manuring,  brewing,  baking, 
etc.,  are  not  proper  occupations  for  scholars.  If  that  is  their  mean- 
ing, I  have  misinterpreted  them,  but  it  is  their  fault.  Of  course 
we  do  not  have  these  practical  manipulations  [wirthschafUiche 
Handthiernngen]  in  mind  when  we  speak  of  a  philosophical  science. 

•  The  word  is  Wirth.  Shall  we  translate  ft  "economist"?  If  we 
do,  we  introduce  an  ambiguous  middle  term  which  falsi6es  our  whole 
subsequent  interpretation  of  evolution  in  German  theory.  One  of  the 
constant  motives  of  this  book  is  to  set  forth  enough  selections  from  the 
mass  of  evidence  to  show  that  English  assumptions  about  the  history 
of  German  thought  have  almost  completely  failed  to  take  account  of  the 
actual  process.  In  fact,  the  conception  of  the  manager  of  economic 
relations  was  much  later  than  this,  and  with  great  difhculty  differentiated 
from  the  conception  of  the  generalizer  0/  economic  operations.  Con- 
sequently the  arts  of  economic  management,  and  the  science  of  economic 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  DARJES  277 

Wc  turn  then  from  these  objections  to  a  positive  description  of 
cameral  science  (§9).  In  the  first  place  we  must  define  certain  uses 
of  terms.  The  chief  theorem  is  this:  Whoever  wishes  to  count  upon 
a  certain  annual  income,  must  look  out  for  the  source  from  which  the 
income  may  flow.  The  theorem  is  supported  as  follows:  Our  yearly 
incomes  flow  either  from  an  established  source,  or  they  depend  upon 
chance,  and  are  thus  beyond  our  control.  Since  it  is  self-evident 
that  in  the  latter  case  we  can  make  no  certain  calculation  upon  the 
yearly  revenues,  wisdom  demands  that  we  look  out  for  a  source  that 
is  capable  of  producing  our  revenues.  In  a  note  Darjes  explains 
that  he  uses  variations  of  the  word  "certain"  or  "assured"  in  this 
connection  in  the  general  sense  in  which  such  terms  are  employed 
in  the  theory  of  morals  and  prudence;  that  is,  not  complete  cer- 
tainty, but  a  high  degree  of  probability  is  the  meaning. 

There  are  two  possible  sources  of  annual  income  (§10):  (a) 
skill  in  the  application  of  our  powers,  or  (6)  an  already  secured 
"good"  which  is  capable  of  producing  a  yearly  profit.  This  latter 
is  called  in  a  special  sense  the  source  of  annual  revenues,  the  fund 
[Fond],  the  capital. 

"I  am  uncertain,"  says  Darjes,  "whether  to  give  precedence  to 
the  former  or  to  the  latter  of  these  sources,  or  whether  they  are 
equivalent  in  respect  to  yearly  income  (§11).  Thus  A  has  a  capital 
of  10,000  Thaler  and  this  3rields  a  yearly  profit  of  500  Thaler. 
B  can  earn  with  his  skill  500  Thaler.  Accordingly  the  one  has  as 
great  an  income  as  the  other.  For  many  reasons  it  might  be  inferred 
that  in  respect  to  yearly  income  the  two  sources  are  indifferent. 

relations  were  (also  much  later  than  this,  and  never  with  quite  the  same 
abstractness  in  Germany  as  in  England)  set  distinctly  over  against  each 
other.  Between  the  cameralistic  period  and  the  economic  period  in  the 
nineteenth-century  sense,  an  evolutionary  process  intervened  in  which 
the  center  of  attention  was  shifted  a  long  distance  away  from  particular 
operations  and  details  of  results  toward  correspondences  of  many  opera- 
tions, and  formulas  of  relations  between  operations  and  results.  German 
experience  before  this  process  was  matured  has  a  value  of  its  own,  but 
we  have  misconceived  most  of  the  value,  because  we  have  assumed  it 
without  proper  reckoning  with  this  evolution  of  purpose  by  which  it 
must  be  interpreted. 


278  THE  CAMERALISTS 

On  the  other  hand  it  is  urged  that  a  capital  is  exposed  to  various 
vicissiluilcs.  We  may  lose  it  by  fraud,  fire,  flood,  and  other  accidents. 
Our  skill  on  the  contrary  is  secure  against  these  attacks.  Persons 
of  the  opposite  view  rcply:  'We  can  earn  nothing  with  our  skill 
if  we  arc  sick;  moreover  it  depends  in  many  ways  upon  the  opinions 
of  other  men  whether  we  shall  l)e  able  to  apply  our  skill.  It  is 
not  always  within  our  power  to  rouse  the  necessary  opinions.  A 
capital,  however,  may  show  itself  effective  whether  we  are  sick  or 
well,  and  whether  men  are  of  one  opinion  or  the  other.'  " 

Most  people  would  conclude  that  capital  and  skill  should  be 
combined  (§12).  Darjes  expresses  his  own  judgment,  however, 
that  ^Ktween  capital  anrl  skill  the  former  is  the  more  secure  source 
of  revenue,  and  for  these  reasons:  The  greater  the  number  of 
accidents  which  may  interfere  with  the  sources  of  our  annual  revenues, 
the  more  easily  these  accidents  may  operate,  and  the  more  indepenfl- 
ent  they  are  of  our  control,  the  less  securely  can  we  reckon  upon  our 
yearly  income.  This  uncertainty  is  greater  in  the  case  of  skill 
than  r)f  capital.  Hence  we  can  more  securely  count  upon  a  yearly 
income  from  capital  than  from  skill. 

In  a  note  (§13)  the  author  specifies  that  he  uses  the  word  "cap- 
ital" not  in  the  narrower  sense  in  which  it  is  applied  to  a  sum  of 
money  which  we  hx)rrow  for  the  sake  of  making  a  profit,  but  in  the 
general  sense,  of  those  acquired  means  which  we  assume  to  te 
permanent,  so  that  they  may  annually  be  efficient  for  our  advantage. 
This  use  of  the  word,  he  says,  is  usual  in  all  writers  on  Haushal- 
tun^skunsi  whom  he  has  read.  "If  there  is  no  objection  to  the  term, 
I  prefer  to  use  the  word  Fond.  I  have  no  objection  to  any  freedom 
which  others  desire  in  this  respect."' 

The  foregoing  must  be  applied  to  the  revenues  of  a  prince 
(514).  It  is  known  from  the  law  of  nature  that  the  prince,  as  a 
memfx;r  of  civic  s^iciety,  must  he  distinguished  from  a  prince  as 
such.*    In  the  latter  character  the  prince  must  be  considered  in  his 

'  r)arjcs  gives  no  hint  of  the  writers  whom  he  had  in  mind  in  this 
connection.  The  probability  is  that  they  were  French,  for  I  have  found 
in  the  earlier  tameralists  no  direct  attempt  to  define  the  use  of  the  term. 

»  This  distinction  seems  to  have  been  assumed  by  all  the  cameralists 
more  or  less  consciously.  The  most  definite  previous  formulation  of  it 
is  in  chap,  vi;  vide  pp.  143  £f.  above. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  DARJES  279 

relation  to  the  state  and  the  subjects.  This  gives  us  a  ground  for 
dividing  the  yearly  revenues  of  the  prince  into  the  personal  and  the 
princely  income. 

The  capital  or  the  '*Fond"  0}  the  princely  revenues  is  the  riches 
of  the  state  and  oj  the  subjects  (§15). 

Whoever  attempts  to  increase  his  yearly  revenues  either  draws 
upon  his  capital,  or  he  seeks  to  increase  his  capital  and  make  it  more 
fruitful  (§16).  The  former  means  is  unreasonable,  because  it 
either  defeats  the  purpose  or  makes  permanent  attainment  of  the 
purpose  impossible.  Hence  the  theorem:  The  increase  oj  yearly 
income  is  unreasonable  when  it  is  brought  to  pass  by  impairing  the 
capital.^ 

In  order  that  our  attempts  to  increase  our  revenues  may  be 
reasonable  they  must  aim  either  to  increase  the  accumulated  capital 
or  to  make  it  more  fruitful  (§17). 

To  appraise  the  riches  of  the  subjects,  we  must  determine  either 
"the  sum  of  their  already  accumulated  capital,  or  the  amount  of 
their  yearly  revenues.  If,  accordingly,  we  understand  that  the 
capital  of  the  princely  revenues  is  the  riches  of  the  subjects,  these 
revenues  are  taken  either  from  the  capital,  which  the  subjects  have 
already  acquired,  or  from  the  yearly  revenues  of  the  subjects.  If  the 
former  method  be  ch6sen,  the  income  of  the  prince  each  time  impairs 
the  capital  of  the  subjects.  This  is  unreasonable.  If  one  will 
accordingly  follow  reason,  one  must  assume  in  this  case  that  the 
capital  or  the  Fond  of  the  princely  revenues  is  the  yearly  income 
of  the  subjects.  Hence  the  general  rule  (§19):  The  first  care 
0}  him  whose  task  it  is  to  raise  the  princely  revenues,  must  be 
to  discover  how  the  yearly  income  oj  the  subjects  may  be  increased. 
Accordingly  a  prince  is  a  rich  prince  when  he  has  rich  and  skiljul 
subjects. 

In  the  Middle  Ages  the  word  Camera  designated  the  place  where 
the  princely  revenues  were  kept  (§21).    Hence  it  occurred  that  men 

» The  importance  of  this  argument  can  hardly  be  estimated  unless 
it  is  connected  with  chap,  cviii,  in  Schroder's  Schatz-  und  Rent-Catnmer. 
We  must  allow  for  the  persistence  in  practice,  to  a  certain  extent  con- 
fusing theory,  of  the  less  mature  idea  of  which  Schroder  was  the  spokes- 
man.    Vide  above,  pp.  135  ff. 


28o  THE  CAMERALISTS 

understood  by  Cameralwesen  those  ordinances  which  defined  the 
Wirthschajt  of  a  prince.  An  orderly  Wirthschaft  consists  of  three 
chief  points  (sic)  viz.:  the  maintenance,  the  raising,  and  the  admin- 
istration of  the  yeariy  revenues.  This  is  enough  to  show  why  we 
understand  by  Cameralwissenschajt  that  science  which  shows  us 
the  reasonable  way  of  preserving,  raising,  and  applying  the 
annual  revenues  of  a  prince.  There  may  be  some  who  disapprove 
the  separation  of  these  purposes,  instead  of  combining  them  in  one 
expression.  To  satisfy  them  we  may  define  Cameralwissenschajt 
as  a  science  of  the  reasonable  Wirthschajt  oj  a  prince. 

A  cameralist  is  one  who  understands  Cameralivissenschajt  (§22); 
more  particularly,  he  must  be  able  to  solve  the  following  problems: 
(i)  How  may  an  established  source  of  the  yearly  revenues  of  a  prince 
be  preserved?  (2)  How  may  the  yearly  income  of  a  prince  be 
reasonably  raised?  (3)  How  is  a  reasonable  application  of  the 
yearly  revenues  of  a  prince  possible  ? 

Cameralistic  technique  consists  then,  first:  (a)  in  finding  means 
capable  of  realizing  the  riches  of  the  state  and  of  the  subjects; 
(6)  in  bringing  the  yeariy  incomes  of  the  subjects  into  certain  classes, 
and  in  determining  their  amount  as  accurately  as  possible  (§23); 
second,  in  finding  reasonable  ways  of  raising  the  annual  revenues 
of  the  prince,  and  consequently  {sic)  of  making  the  subjects  richer 
and  more  skilful  (§34). 

Our  yeariy  revenues  are  either  direct  workings  of  nature  or  the 
output  of  the  latter  is  based  upon  our  occupations,  which  in  turn 
presuppose  a  certain  skill  which  we  have  acquired  by  our  eflForts 
(§25).  These  occupations  either  put  nature  in  a  condition  to  accom- 
plish that  which  is  possible  for  her,  or  out  of  natural  products  they 
produce  other  things  which  are  useful  for  the  human  race.  This 
taken  for  granted,  it  is  clear  that  in  respect  to  the  second  point,  a 
true  cameralist  must  understand:  (a)  the  true  qualities  of  natural 
objects,  and  what  can  be  brought  to  pass  by  means  of  them;  (6) 
how  nature  can  be  made  more  skilful  in  bringing  forth  what  is 
possible  for  her;  (c)  how  other  things  for  the  use  of  men  may  be 
produced  from  the  yield  of  nature.  And  the  author  adds  in  a  note: 
"We  speak  of  'the  use  of  men'  not  in  a  moral,  but  in  a  political  sense, 
according  to  which  everything  is  useful  for  the  human  race  which 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  DARJES  281 

may  bring  about  its  preservation,  happiness,  and  the  improvement 
of  welfare.  The  science  with  which  we  are  now  concerned  demands 
that  we  should  attach  such  a  meaning  to  the  word." 

It  is  hardly  necessary  to  point  out  that  we  have  here  a  seed 
of  the  sort  of  thinking  which  developed  later  into  pure  econom- 
ics of  the  nineteenth-century  type.    The  argument  continues: 

By  these  signs  we  may  distinguish  between  a  true  cameralist 
and  a  despoiler  of  the  country  [Landverderber]  (§26).  There  arc 
people  devoted  to  raising  the  revenues  of  a  prince,  who  cilhcr  through 
wantonness  or  stupidity  are  restrained  from  taking  the  way  which 
wisdom  prescribes,  i.e.,  the  way  of  increasing  the  yearly  rci'cnucs 
of  the  subjects.  They  think  they  have  fully  discharged  the  duties 
of  their  office  if  they  find  schedules  which  would  increase  the  annual 
payments  of  the  subjects.  These  people  increase  the  annual  rcvcn  ucs 
of  the  prince  by  weakening  the  capital.  This  increase  is  of  no 
duration.  The  subjects  and  the  state  must  eventually  grow  poorer. 
This  is  enough  to  show  that  such  people  do  not  deserve  the  name 
cameralist.  They  are  the  plague  in  the  state,  and  for  this  reason 
are  called  despoilers  of  the  country. 

On  the  contrary  (§28),  the  true  cameralist  proposes  to  increase 
the  yearly  incomes  of  the  subjects.  The  subjects  must  accordingly 
not  only  be  put  in  a  situation  in  which  it  is  possible  for  them  to 
increase  their  incomes,  but  their  will  must  lead  them  to  the  necessary 
occupation.  This  latter  demands  an  awakening  of  their  zeal  for 
labor.  The  former  demands,  first,  an  understanding  of  the  possible 
increase  of  revenues;  second,  possession  of  those  means  through 
which  the  understanding  may  be  skilfully  applied;  third,  removal 
of  all  those  circumstances  which  might  obstruct  the  execution  of  this 
purpose.  Accordingly,  in  respect  to  the  second  main  task,  a  came- 
ralist must  further  understand  how  the  state  is  to  be  arranged  (sic)  in 
order  (a)  to  rouse  in  the  subjects  a  zeal  for  labor;  (b)  to  enable  the 
subjects  to  gain  adequate  understanding  of  the  possible  increase  of 
incomes;  (c)  to  insure  to  the  subjects  adequate  provision  of  means 
and  opportunity  skilfully  to  apply  the  acquired  understanding; 
(d)  to  guard  the  subjects  against  hindrances  to  convenient  disposal 
of  the  things  which  they  have  produced. 


282  THE  CAMERALISTS 

The  reason  why  a  cameralist  concerns  himself  with  these  points 
is  to  raise  the  annual  revenues  of  a  prince  (§29).  This  is  the  principal 
occupation  through  which  he  is  distinguished  from  another  scientific 
manager  [H^tr/A].  But  this  peculiar  occupation  demands  that  he 
shall  observe  more  than  one  rule.  It  follows  immediately  that  he 
must  understand  (a)  how  a  prince  may  raise  his  yearly  revenues 
from  the  yearly  incomes  of  the  subjects,  without  weakening  the 
source  of  the  same;  (b)  how,  through  the  reasonable  use  of  the 
yearly  revenues  of  a  prince,  the  yearly  incomes  of  the  subjects  may 
be  preserved  and  increased.' 

We  come  then  to  the  third  main  task,  viz.,  the  reasonable  use 
o(  the  annual  revenues  of  a  prince  (§30).  Whoever  manages  wisely 
brings  his  revenues  and  his  outlays  into  certain  classes.  He  dis- 
tinguishes the  necessary  outlays  from  those  that  are  less  necessary. 
He  compares  the  outlay  with  the  income,  and  designates  for  each 
cla.ss  of  outlays  a  particular  class  of  revenues.  Hence,  in  respect 
to  this  third  task,  a  cameralist  must  understand  (a)  how  to  bring  the 
revenues  of  a  prince  into  certain  classes;  (ft)  how  to  determine  the 
yearly  outlays  of  a  prince,  and  how  these  are  to  be  divided  in  certain 
orders;  (c)  how  to  compare  the  annual  outlays  of  a  prince  with  his 
annual  revenues,  and  how  a  special  class  of  the  revenues  may  be 
assigned  to  each  sort  of  outlay. 

It  follows  that  an  introduction  to  Cameralwissenschaft  must  first 
outline  the  operations  of  nature.  Accordingly  we  have  as  the  first 
part  of  the  science,  Landwirlhschaft  [Oeconomia  rustica]  (§31). 

A  note  upon  this  section  offords  another  instructive  sign 
of  the  progress  of  analysis  in  this  field.     Darjes  says: 

Many  who  treat  of  Oeconomie  interpret  it  in  a  moral  sense,  since 
they  regard  us  as  in  an  interdependence  of  those  rules  in  accordance 
with  which  a  reasonable  Wirlhschaft  must  be  arranged,  and  we  have 
made  a  brief  sketch  of  these  in  the  philosophical  theory  of  morals. 

'  Throughout  this  discussion,  and  in  the  same  connection  in  other 
ramcrallsls,  there  is  ambiguity  in  the  words  which  I  have  translated 
"raise  the  revenue,"  etc.  The  meaning  is  sometimes  "increase  the 
revenue,"  but  it  is  not  always  clear  to  the  writers  themselves  which  they 
mr-an. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  DARJES  283 

The  cameralist  presupposes  this  treatment,  and  he  goes  farther. 
He  investigates  how  these  general  rules  can  be  applied  to  the  works 
of  nature.  For  this  reason  he  busies  himself  with  Oeconomie  in  the 
physical  sense,  yet  not  as  a  peasant,  but  as  a  philosopher.  He  works 
out  a  conception  of  the  workings  of  nature,  of  the  natural  causes 
of  these  workings;  of  completeness  in  the  workings  of  nature,  and 
of  the  means  of  making  these  causes  capable  of  rendering  the  work- 
ings complete.  From  these  conceptions  he  deduces  general  theo- 
rems which  serve  him  as  rules  in  a  S[x.'cillc  case,  and  hereby  he 
becomes  a  philosophical  Latid-Wirth,  who  is  able  to  regulate  the 
Landwirthschajt  in  a  country,  and  to  make  it  more  complete  for  the 
profit  of  the  state. 

The  passage  calls  for  the  observation  that  the  development 
of  thought  in  Germany  at  this  time,  upon  subjects  afterward 
differently  allotted  among  nineteenth-century  social  sciences, 
was  by  no  means  confined  to  the  cameralists.  We  must  remem- 
ber, while  analyzing  cameralistic  thinking,  that  this  was  merely 
one  of  the  factors  in  the  whole  thought-movement  of  the  time, 
within  the  range  which  we  may  call  in  general  sociological. 

Darjes  accordingly  classifies  the  first  i)art  of  Landwirth- 
schajt in  three  divisions,  dealing  resjiectively  with  {a)  the 
workings  of  nature  and  the  means  of  making  them  more 
complete;  ih)  agriculture;  (r)  cattle  raising  (§32).  He  calls 
the  second  part  of  Cameralwissenschaft,  dealing  with  those 
things  which  may  be  produced  V)y  artificial  control  of  the 
workings  of  nature,  Stadtwirthscha/t  or  Oeconomia  urbaua 
(§33),  and  its  subdivisions  deal  with  (a)  Gewerken  in  which 
the  forces  of  nature  are  employed  in  producing  certain  goods, 
such  as  beer,  alcohol,  and  starch;  {b)  Manufacturen  uud 
Fabriquen,  which  produce  things  which  nature  by  herself 
could   not  produce   (§34). 

Darjes  makes  Policeiiuissenschaft  the  third  part  of  Canie- 
ralwissenschaft,  and  he  explains: 

The  Greeks  understand  by  the  word  ToXire/a  those  laws  of  a 


284  THE  CAMERALISTS 

state  upon  which  its  beauty  and  well-being  rest.'  The  state  is 
accordingly  beautiful,  and  its  well-being  is  assured,  if  its  subjects 
have  flourishing  means  of  subsistence.  This  is  sufficient  to  show 
why  the  name  has  been  given  to  this  third  part  of  Cameralwissen- 
schajt.  This  part  of  the  science  is  concerned  with:  (0)  the  popula- 
tion of  the  state;  (6)  establishment  of  schools  and  universities;  {c) 
political  establishment  of  the  ecclesiastical  system:  {d)  incitement 
of  subjects  to  labor;  {e)  arrangements  of  the  state  preserving  the 
health  of  subjects;  (/)  beauty  of  the  country;  {g)  promotion  of 
security;    (A)  care  of  the  poor,  etc.  (§36). 

The  cameralist  must  finally  apply  the  sciences  thus  described 
to  the  Wirthschajt  of  a  prince,  as  prince  (§37).  This  application 
makes  the  fourth  part  of  Cameralwissenschajt  which  has  appro- 
priated the  name  Cameralwissenschajt  in  a  peculiar  sense.  Its  sub- 
divisions are:  (a)  determination  of  the  various  sources  of  the  princely 
revenues;  (6)  devising  of  ways  and  means  to  draw  from  these 
sources;  (c)  description  of  the  regular  application  of  the  annual 
revenues  of  a  prince.' 

We  are  not  concerned  with  comparative  tec  hi  que  in  any 
part  of  the  cameral  sciences,  and  we  may  allow  this  general 
description  to  represent  Darjes'  professional  equation  in  the 
cameralistic  group.^ 

<  Substantially  the  same  explanation  is  given  more  at  length,  with 
quotation  from  Xenophon's  Athenian  Republic,  in  Justi's  Grundfeste, 
I.  5- 

2  The  author  promises  to  name,  as  occasion  requires,  books  on  the 
various  subjects;  but  he  refers  in  general  to  Rohr's  Haushaltungs- 
Bihliothek  and  "Zink,"  Cameral-Bihliothek. 

3  If  the  sources  had  been  accessible,  I  should  have  added  an  estimate 
of  Johann  Jacob  Moscr  as  an  index  of  the  spirit  of  cameralism.  I  have 
as  yet  no  means  of  testing  the  reliability  of  Roscher's  account  (pp. 
441  ff). 


CHAPTER  XIII 
THE  CAMERALISTICS  OF  JUSTI 

Since  we  have  referred  to  Seckendorff  as  the  Adam  Smith 
of  cameralism,  we  may  carry  out  the  conceit  by  calling  Jusli 
the  John  Stuart  Mill  of  the  movement.  In  each  case,  however, 
the  analogy  rests  upon  points  of  resemblance  which  would  be 
rated  as  trivial  after  critical  investigation.  It  is  true,  never- 
theless, that,  as  a  pioneer  in  reducing  an  administrative  pro- 
gramme to  literary  expression,  Seckendorff  occupies  very  much 
the  same  relative  position  in  the  development  of  cameralistic 
theory  which  Smith  occupied  later  in  the  evolution  of  an 
abstract  theory  of  wealth.  It  is  also  true  that  Justi  organized 
the  cameralistic  technology  which  had  been  developed  up  to 
his  time  into  a  system  of  theory  which  correlated  the  different 
phases  of  cameralism,  very  much  as  Mill  gave  to  the  doctrines 
of  classical  economics  their  most  impressive  rendering.  It 
would  hardly  be  profitable  to  pursue  farther  the  quest  of  like- 
ness or  unlikeness  in  either  case. 

The  original  plan  of  this  book  proposed  to  present  Justi 
alone  as  the  type  of  cameralism  in  general.  Further  reflection 
led  to  change  of  the  plan  to  the  programme  here  followed. 
The  principal  reason  was  that,  if  the  first  intention  had  been 
carried  out,  it  could  not  have  forestalled  the  criticism:  "One 
case  cannot  justify  a  generalization.  Nothing  appears  in 
evidence  to  prove  that  Justi  was  not  an  exception  rather  than  a 
type."  Since  the  literature  by  which  this  objection  is  removed 
is  so  inaccessible  to  Americans,  mere  assertion  that  it  exists,' 
or  even  copious  references  to  particular  passages,  would  fail 
adequately  to  present  the  cameralists  to  English  readers. 
The  alternative  chosen  was  an  attempt  to  survey  the  whole 
cameralistic  period  and  to  divide  attention  in  proportion  to  the 
relative  importance  of  the  principal  writers. 

285 


286  THE  CAMERALISTS 

The  most  convincing  biographical  study  of  Justi  has  been 
made  by  Frensdorff,  We  follow  his  conclusions  in  reducing 
to  the  lowest  terms  such  details  as  are  necessary  for  our  pur- 
pose.' 

Johann  Heinrich  Gottlob  von  Justi,  son  of  the  Gerichthalter 
Georg  Heinrich  Justi,  was  baptized  December  28,  171 7,  in  the 
evangelisch-lutherische  Kirche  at  BrUcken  an  der  Helme 
{Regierungsbezirk  Merseburg,  Kreis  Sanger hausen).  The  story 
that  he  was  bom  on  Christmas  eve  of  that  year  is  thus  not 
improbable.  Of  his  earlier  years  little  is  known.  The  traces 
of  his  university  career  are  rather  dubious.  The  most  reliable 
of  them  are  at  Wittenberg.  Partly  within  his  student  period 
he  had  some  army  experience.  "Although  Justi's  military 
period  was  no  longer  than  his  academic  career,  it  left  traces 
which  may  be  observed  for  a  long  time  in  his  writings.  He 
often  made  use  of  observations  collected  (1741-42)  during 
the  war  of  the  Austrian  succession"  (Frensdorff,  p.  363). 
Justi  credited  the  lieutenant-colonel  of  the  regiment  to  which 

»  F.  Frensdorff,  "Ueber  das  Leben  und  die  Schriften  des  Natio- 
nalokonotnen  J.  H.  G.  von  Justi,"  Nachrichlen  von  der  Konigl.  Gesell- 
schaft  der  Wissenschaft  xu  Goltingen.  Philologisch-historische  Klasse, 
aus  dem  Jahre  1903.  Gottingen,  1904.  (Pp.  354-503.)  It  would  be 
an  unfortunate  misdirection  of  energy  to  enter  upon  examination  of 
Justi's  career  under  the  guidance  of  the  previous  accounts  of  his  life: 
e.  g.,  the  article  in  All.  d.  Bib.;  Roscher's  essay,  in  Archiv/ur  die  Sack- 
sische  Ceschichte,  6ter  Bd.,  pp.  77  ff.;  the  digest  of  that  essay,  Gesch., 
pp.  444  fl.,  etc.  My  first  loss  of  confidence  in  the  reliability  of  Roscher 
in  matters  of  detail  came  from  discovery  of  numerous  inaccuracies  in  his 
biography  of  Justi.  These  related  to  items  on  which  the  text  of  the  author's 
works  is  final.  Frensdorff  has  used  sources  of  other  kinds,  not  accessible 
in  this  country.  He  has  not  only  discovered  Roscher's  mistakes  in  cases 
of  the  lyiK;  just  referred  to,  but  he  has  proved  that  previous  biographical 
skeuhes  of  Justi  were  largely  fabulous.  An  earlier  monograph  by  the 
same  author  should  be  consulted:  Festschrift  tur  Feier  des  hundert- 
funjzigjdhrigen  Bestehens  der  Kdnigl.  Cesellschaft  der  Wissenschaften 
2u  CiiHtingen,  "Bcitrage  zur  Gclehrtengeschichte  Gottingens"  (Berlin 
lyoi),  pp.  495  ff- 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  JUSTI  287 

he  belonged  with  turning  the  course  of  his  life  to  legal  and  scien- 
tific pursuits. 

Justi's  first  publication  was  Die  Dichterinsel  (1745),  a 
combination  of  Utopia  and  satire  feebly  resembling  Swift's 
Gulliver.  At  about  the  same  time,  Justi  began,  to  publish  in 
Dresden  a  monthly  magazine,  under  the  title  Ergetzungen  der 
vernUnftigen  Seele  aus  der  Sittenlehre  und  der  Gelehrsamkeit 
Uberhaupt.  During  the  remainder  of  his  life  Justi  seemed 
never  content  unless  he  was  addressing  the  public  through  one 
or  more  journals  of  various  types. 

In  the  course  of  the  year  1747,  Justi  removed  to  Sanger- 
hausen,  where  his  name  is  known  first  as  Advocat,  then  as 
Rath  der  verwittweten  Herzogin  von  Sachsen-Eisenach. 
Although  the  term  Witthumsrathy  used  in  flippant  allusion 
to  this  incident,  seems  to  indicate  that  the  sonorous  title  was 
not  everywhere  taken  seriously,  on  the  other  hand,  perhaps 
without  exceeding  the  privileges  which  at  the  time  went  with 
any  title  whatsoever,  Justi  evidently  regarded  the  designation 
obtained  from  the  Herzogin  as  an  available  asset,  and  he 
made  good  use  of  it  as  a  help  to  something  better. 

Justi's  next  step  toward  distinction  was  the  composition  of 
a  monograph  on  a  subject  calling  for  review  of  Leibnitz'  theory 
of  monads.  The  subject  was  proposed  for  a  prize  contest  by 
the  Berliner  Akademie  der  Wissenschaften,  and  the  prize  was 
awarded  to  Justi  in  1747  (Frensdorflf,  p.  371). 

Presently  Justi  changed  his  residence  to  Vienna.  Of  this 
episode  Frensdorfl  says  (p.  375): 

The  period  of  his  stay  here  is  the  most  important  of  his  life. 
From  this  point  dates  the  turning  of  his  mind  to  the  science  which 
was  to  give  him  his  place  in  history.  Up  to  this  time  he  had  traversed 
many  fields  with  his  facile  journalistic  pen — polite  literature,  phi- 
losophy, history,  jurisprudence,  etc.  He  now  began  to  cultivate  the 
economic  sciences.  His  removal  to  Vienna  had  much  to  do  with 
this  transition. 


288  THE  CAMERALISTS 

Justi  arrived  in  Austria  at  precisely  the  time  when  Maria  Theresia 
had  put  her  improving  hand  upon  all  departments  of  the  inner  life 
of  the  state.  The  system  of  taxation  and  the  organization  of  civic 
functionaries  were  reconstructed,  so  that  the  government  was 
indefx^ndent  of  the  estates,  and  a  central  control  of  internal  affairs 
was  fxjssihle.  These  reforms  reached  their  most  definite  expressions 
through  Haugwitz,  head  of  the  political  and  cameral  administration. 
....  The  reforms  which  he  introduced  in  general  administration 
were  also  Vx^neficial  to  the  educational  institutions  founded  at  the 
same  period.  Both  the  Theresianum,  founded  in  1746,  and  the 
Savoysche  Ritlerakademie  proposed  to  furnish  a  training  for  aristo- 
cratic youths  which  would  provide  the  state  with  more  competent 
stnants  both  civil  and  military. 

No  sufficient  explanation  of  Justi's  initial  success  at  Vienna 
has  been  found.  At  all  events,  he  was  appointed,  August  31, 
1 750,  to  the '' Professura  eloquentiae  germankae"  in  iheCoUegium 
Theresianum.  In  connection  with  this  professorship,  Justi 
was  instructed  to  ofler  lectures  entitled  ^'collegium  oeconomico- 
proi'infiale,''  which  included  '' Finanzen,  Handel,  Contribu- 
tionale  (Steuemesen)  und  Afanu/arturwesen."  The  immediate 
occasion  for  this  course,  which  was  incidental  to  a  larger 
educational  porgramme,  was  similar  to  that  which  had  led 
the  king  of  Prussia,  a  quarter-century  earlier,  to  establish  the 
cameralistic  chairs  at  Halle  and  Frankfurt  a.  O.,  viz.,  the 
desire  to  supplement  the  traditional  courses  at  the  university 
by  instruction  which  would  be  direct  preparation  for  official 
service. 

The  d<x:ument  which  marks  Justi's  entrance  into  the 
cameralistic  series  was  in  the  nature  of  a  report  to  the  empress 
(1752),  containing  a  prospectus  of  cameralistic  study.' 

At  particular  command  of  the  empress,  Justi  was  com- 
missifined   to  deal   specifically  with   the  subject  of  mining. 

'  Auj  hdchslen  Bejehl  an  Sr.  Rom.  Kaiserl.  und  zu  Ungarn  und 
Bohmen  Konigl.  Majesldt  erstaltetes  alleruntertdnigstes  Cutachten  von 
dem  vernunjtigen  Zusammenhange  und  praktischen  Vortrage  aller  Oeko- 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  JUSTI  289 

Thereupon  he  gave  his  attention  not  merely  to  the  theory,  but 
to  the  actual  development  of  the  mineral  resources  of  Austria. 
This  particular  element  in  his  activities  may  have  had  much 
or  little  to  do  with  the  brevity  of  his  stay  in  Vienna.  At  all 
events  his  connection  with  mining  administration  proved  to  be 
his  final  undoing.  For  reasons  which  are  as  confused  as  the 
explanations  of  his  coming  to  Austria,  among  them  friction 
with  the  ecclesiastical  authorities,  Justi  returned  to  North 
Germany  in  1753.  Stieda  thinks  (p.  33)  that  he  did  not  even 
begin  his  lectures  on  cameralistics  in  Vienna.  Frensdorff,  on 
the  contrary,  is  quite  sure  he  was  the  first  teacher  of  the  eco- 
nomic sciences  in  Austria  (p.  389).  Unless  we  presume  that 
Justi  had  forgotten  the  facts  in  less  than  eight  years,  or  that 
he  deliberately  lied,  his  own  assertion,  which  Stieda  seems 
to  have  overlooked,  is  decisive.^ 

Light  is  thrown  on  Justi's  reasons  for  leaving  Vienna  by 
his  hints  that  the  Jesuits  were  hostile  to  him,  and  had  spies  at 
the  doors  and  windows  of  his  lecture-room.*  He  also  says 
that  the  rector  told  him  flatly,  "There  is  no  need  of  Cameral- 
wissenschaft  und  Policei;  Austria  has  been  prosperous  a  long 
time  without  anything  of  that  sort.  If  people  are  only  i)ious 
and  say  their  prayers,  God  will  bless  the  country  without 
such  stufiF."3 

Reviewing  the  Austrian  passage  in  Justi's  career,  Frens- 
dorff says  (p.  389) : 

nomischen  und  Kameralwissenschaflen  ....  von  Herrn  Hofrat  u.  Pro- 
fessor J.  H.  G.  edlen  Herrn  v.  Justi.  Herausgegeben  von  Dr.  E.  W., 
Leipzig,  1754.  According  to  Stieda's  description  (p.  32)  this  docu- 
ment contains  virtually  the  same  progranime  afterward  proposed  in  the 
Preface  of  Staatswirthschaft.  In  the  latter  form  it  will  be  discussed 
below. 

"It  is  quoted  below;  vide  p.  336,  note. 

»  Staatswirthschaft,  I,  119.  It  does  not  seem  to  me  that  Frensdorff 
has  given  due  weight  to  this  evidence. 

i  Crundriss  einer  guten  Regierung,  p.  324. 


290  THE  CAMERALISTS 

Brief  as  was  his  stay  in  Austria,  the  time  was  not  lost  for  Austria 
nor  for  himself.  As  one  line  leads  back  from  him  to  the  most 
eminent  representatives  of  Volkswirthschajt  under  Kaiser  Leopold  I, 
so  another  connects  him  with  those  who  followed.    Justi  continued 

the  work  of  Becher,  Schroder,  and  Homick Each  had  at 

heart  the  question  how  Austria  might  be  made  more  prosperous  by 
means  of  Landesoekonomie  or  Volkswirthschajt.  They  solve  the 
question  according  to  the  principles  of  the  mercantilists;  and  the 
difference  between  them  and  Justi  is  his  more  abstract  procedure. 
He  is  not  concerned  in  the  first  instance  with  a  particular  country. 
He  tries  to  lay  down  principles  of  universal  validity,  and  while  they 
handle  their  material  in  a  popular  way,  Justi  puts  his  in  the  form  of 
a  dogmatic  and  schematically  complete  exposition.' 

Justi  left  Austria  during  the  year  1753.  On  New  Year, 
1754  at  Mansfeld,  he  signed  the  prospectus  of  a  new  monthly 
journal;'  he  appears  to  have  been  for  a  short  time  in  Leipzig, 
but  in  1755  he  appears  in  Gottingen.  The  reasons  which 
account  for  these  movements  remain  unexplained.  In  Got- 
tingen Justi  combined  the  activities  of  PoUteidirector  with  the 
academic  function  of  lecturer  on  cameralistic  subjects.^  In 
June,  1757,  however,  Justi  left  Gottingen.  Again  the  reasons 
are  largely  matters  of  conjecture.  The  action  for  divorce 
brought  by  his  wife  doubtless  had  something  to  do  with  the 
brevity  of  his  stay.  He  next  appears  (1757)  as  Bergrath  in 
the  service  of  the  king  of  Denmark.  This  Danish  episode 
lasted  less  than  a  year.  He  moved  to  Altona,  then  to  Hamburg, 
where  he  made  the  acquaintance  of  the  Prussian  resident  von 
Hecht.  From  this  time  to  the  end  of  the  Seven  Years'  War, 
Justi  did  a  great  deal  of  political  writing.    He  affected  a 

'  This  estimate  must  be  considerably  qualified,  especially  as  to  the 
contrast  of  purpose  between  Justi  and  his  predecessors.  I  note  my 
partial  dissent,  however,  without  further  comment. 

'  Neue  WahrheiUn  turn  Vortheil  der  Naturkunde  und  des  gesell- 
uhafUichen  Lebens  der  Menschen.     Vide  Frensdorff,  p.  391. 

sFrensdorff,  p.  393. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  JUSTI  291 

manner  which  purported  to  set  the  issues  of  the  day  in  the  light 
of  a  comprehensive  political  philosophy. 

Justi  appears  to  have  remained  in  Hamburg  until  some 
time  between  1758  and  1760.  From  the  spring  of  the  latter 
year*  his  books  are  dated  at  Berlin,  and  the  title,  "Kgl.  Gross- 
britannischer  Bergrath,"  disappears. 

Justi's  occupations  and  status  in  Berlin  are  extremely 
uncertain  up  to  1765,  when  he  was  appointed  Berghauptmann. 
From  this  vantage  ground  he  secured  the  notice  and  favor  of  the 
king,  who  indorsed  rather  extensive  plans  for  the  development 
of  mines.  On  the  other  hand  Justi  seems  almost  immediately 
to  have  made  enemies.  These  were  partly  personal  creditors, 
partly  bidders  for  the  opportunities  which  his  office  controlled 
or  influenced.  Presently  more  serious  trouble  came.  Ques- 
tions were  raised  about  Justi's  financial  administration.  The 
outcome  was  judicial  investigation  which  resulted  in  his 
arrest  and  confinement  at  Kiistrin  (February  9,  1768).*  At 
the  time  of  his  death,  probably  from  apoplexy,  he  was  carrying 
on  the  legal  fight  for  release.  He  maintained  that  the  whole 
case  was  trumped  up  by  enemies,  and  according  to  his  daugh- 
ter's statement,  he  expressed  his  confidence,  the  evening  before 
his  death,  that  the  process  would  result  in  his  favor.  Although 
it  is  possible,  and  even  probable,  that  in  the  whole  matter 
Justi  was  "more  sinned  against  than  sinning,"  we  must  admit 
that  the  incident  at  best  deepens  the  impression  left  by  the 
most  favorable  version  of  his  earlier  life.  With  all  his  intel- 
lectual versatility,  Justi  never  shows  a  sign  of  moral  strength. 

Returning  to  our  main  interest,  viz.,  the  cameralists  as 
authors,  not  as  individuals,   we  are  obliged  to  disentangle 

«  Roscher  says  "from  1763"  (p.  444);  but  the  Vorrede  of  Vol.  I 
of  the  Grundfeste  is  dated  "Berlin  den  25.  April  1760;"  of  Vol.  II,  ''Ber- 
lin, den  6.  April  iy6i;"  while  the  Vorrede  of  Nalur  und  Wesen  der 
Staaten  is  subscribed,  " Gesckrieben  zur  Leipziger  Michaelis-Messe  17S9-" 

*  Vide  Frensdorfl,  pp.  449  S. 


292  thp:  cameralists 

Justi's  camcralistic  works  from  a  mass  of  miscellaneous  writ- 
ings. Meusel's  Lexikon  schedules  forty-eight  works  which 
he  published  between  1741  and  1771,  many  of  them  in  several 
volumes.  They  fall  into  six  groups:  (i)  aesthetics  and  belles 
lettres;  (2)  philosophy;  (3)  natural  science;  (4)  history; 
(5)  law  and  statesmanship;  (6)  cameralistics  in  the  wide  sense. 

Most  of  his  books  were  dashed  off  with  genial  carelessness,  and 
with  notorious  disregard  of  the  literature  of  the  subjects  treated. 
lie  fics[)isefl  all  science  which  could  not  be  turned  to  tangible  uses, 
philology,  mathematics,  astronomy;  in  the  latter  case  showing  his 
ignorance  by  sneering  at  the  inaccuracy  of  astronomical  opinions.' 
Such  reaction  against  earlier  one-sidedness  probably  had  a  certain 
vjilue.  At  the  same  time  it  became  itself  vcPr-  plain  one-sidedness 
when,  for  example,  Justi  admitted  the  right  to  kill  in  self-defense, 
but  merely  to  preser\'e  one's  own  life,  not  however  "to  preserve  those 
chimeras  and  absurd  treasures  which  we  have  constructed  out  of 
honor,  and  property,  which  is  probably  not  in  accordance  with  the 
will  of  God,  or  out  of  female  virtue,  and  perhaps  even  of  virginity"* 
(Roscher  in  Archiv  jiir  Sachs.  Ceschichle,  Bd.  6,  pp.  77  ff.). 

One  might  read  Justi's  camcralistic  books  a  long  time 
without  happening  upon  express  recognition  that  anything 
wf)rlh  notice  had  f)reviously  been  written  on  the  subjects 
treated.  Tardy  and  grudging  references  to  other  authors 
occur,  but  they  do  not  by  any  means  give  due  credit  for  Justi's 
f  I  rafts  upon  his  predecessors.  He  succeeded  in  eclipsing 
them  y)artly  because  he  had  rather  unusually  acute  political 
instincts.  Besides  this,  he  was  a  skilled  organizer  of  literary 
material.  If  he  was  not  a  j)lagiarist  in  the  strict  sense,  he  was 
a  f)ersistent  absorber  and  purveyor  of  other  people's  ideas 
as  his  own.  While  this  fact  foredooms  certain  tendencies  to 
irlealize  Justi  as  an  originator  in  the  social  sciences,  it  indicates 
his  value  as  a  summarizer  of  previous  social  science.     Justi 

'  Staatswirlhscha/t,  I,  xxiv. 

»  Natur  und  Wesen  der  Staaten,  pp.  176  ff. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  JUSTI  293 

repeatedly  excuses  his  omission  to  cite  other  writers,  on  the 
ground  that  such  references  merely  serve  to  parade  an  author's 
learning.*  He  has  a  euphemistic  substitute  for  frank  con- 
fession in  the  following  passage:' 

I  have  never  owned  a  book  which  I  have  not  read  entirely 
through,  and  my  memory  was  so  strong  that  in  case  of  all  notable 
passages  I  not  only  knew  the  volume  in  which  they  were  to  be  found, 
but  also  the  chapter  and  usually  the  page.  Indeed,  I  have  often 
introduced  into  my  writings  from  memory  passages  many  lines 
long  without  again  referring  to  the  book.  This  extraordinary 
memory  has  been  growing  weaker  for  several  years,  and  I  am  learn- 
ing the  value  of  good  tables  of  contents. 

Our  plan  requires  a  review  of  the  most  important  of  Justi's 
cameralistic  books,  as  nearly  as  possible  in  their  chronological 
order.  We  shall  find  at  least  the  elements  of  all  his  subse- 
quent books  in  the  Staatswirthschaft.^ 

We  must  give  more  than  passing  notice  to  the  strategic 
force  of  the  expression  on  the  title-page,  "which  are  requisite 
for  the  government  of  a  country."  The  phrase  at  once  puts 
to  the  front  the  purpose  and  viewpoint  of  cameralism,  viz.: 

<  E.  g.,  in  the  last  paragraph  of  the  Vorrede  of  the  first  edition  of 
CrundsiUu  der  Policeywissenschaft. 

*  Vorrede  to  the  "zwoten  Ausgabe"  of  the  book  just  cited,  1759. 

3  Johann  Heinrich  GoUlobs  von  Jusli  Staatswirthschaft,  oder  sys- 
tematische  Abhandlung  oiler  Oekonomischen  und  Corner al-Wissenschaf ten, 
die  tur  Regierung  eines  Landes  erfodert  werden.  In  zweien  Theilen 
ausgefertigt.  Erster  Theil,  Welcher  die  Lehre  von  Erhaltung  und  Ver- 
mehrung  des  Vermogens  des  Stools,  und  mithin  die  Staatskunst,  die 
Policey-  und  Commercien-Wissenschoft  nebst  der  Hausholtungskunst 
in  sich  begreifft.    Zweyte  stark  vermehrte  Auflage 1758- 

The  title-page  of  the  second  part  of  the  book,  bound  in  the  same 
volume,  is  varied  as  follows:  Zweyter  Theil,  Welcher  die  Lehre  von  dent 
verniinftigen  Gebrauche  des  Vermogens  des  Stoates,  und  mithin  die  eigent- 
liche  Cameral-  oder  Finanz-Wissenschqft  in  sich  begreifft.  Nebst  einem 
voUsldndigen  Register  iiber  beyde  Theile. 

I  have  seen  Professor  E.  R.  A.  Seligman's  copy  of  the  same  edition. 
It  is  bound  in  two  volumes,  but  the  binding  is  evidently  much  later  than 
that  of  the  copy  which  I  chiefly  used. 


294  THE  CAMERALISTS 

first,  the  paramount  state — whether  the  princelingdom  of 
Reuss  or  the  kingdom  of  Prussia,  is  immaterial — a  dominant 
conception  of  what  belongs  to  thrifty  state-housekeeping,  and 
Staatswirthschaft  as  the  tradition  of  the  technique  which 
accomplishes  that  species  of  thrift. 

We  must  set  it  down  as  a  fixed  fact  that  this  is  an  element 
in  the  historical  development  of  German  social  science,  and  of 
German  government,  which  accounts  for  certain  of  the  typical 
contrasts  with  English  theoretical  and  practical  tradition. 

In  order  to  obtain  a  general  conception  of  the  range  of 
Staatswirthschaft  as  Justi  and  others  taught  it,  and  as  most  of 
the  higher  civic  officials  in  Germany  learned  it,  till  a  more 
modem  organization  of  science  was  brought  into  vogue  by 
Rau  (Lehrbuch  der  poUtischen  Oekonomie,  1826,  etc.),  the 
Table  of  Contents  should  be  examined. 

The  first  impression  which  the  book  would  make  upon 
any  fairly  intelligent  person,  who  happened  upon  it  with  no 
previous  hints  about  its  contents,  would  be  that  it  was  intended 
as  a  digest  of  knowledge  useful  for  civic  functionaries.  The 
f)rimary  thesis  which  the  book  and  all  the  other  writings  of 
Justi  on  related  subjects  justify  is  that  social  problems  pre- 
.scntcd  themselves  to  the  author  principally  as  problems  of 
civic  administration.  That  is,  the  autonomous,  patriarchal 
petty  slate  was  the  ever-present  working  assumption.  Justi 
is  thus  strictly  in  line  with  camcralistic  tradition  as  we  have 
made  it  out  from  the  beginning. 

Since  Jusli's  work  is  in  efifect  a  recapitulation  of  cameralism, 
we  are  justified  in  rej)roducing  rather  fully  his  own  review  of 
the  state  of  camcralistic  knowledge  at  the  time  of  writing. 
The  Preface  to  the  first  edition  of  Staatswirthschaft  clears  the 
ground  in  this  way: 

The  economic  and  cameral  sciences  are  very  old  in  the  world. 
The  api)lication  of  them  occurred  indeed  the  moment  property  was 
introduced  among  men,  and  a'publics  came  into  existence. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  JUSTI  295 

This  delightfully  unconstrainc<l  style  of  historical  free- 
lancing at  once  illustrates  Justi's  irresponsibility  to  authorities. 
Yet  it  would  be  unfair  to  treat  him  as  exceptional  in  making 
hearsay  a  suflficicnt  basis  for  historical  generalization.  Europe 
was  still  in  its  age  of  fable.  It  was  half  a  century  after  the 
writing  of  this  preface  when  Niebuhr's  first  volume  on  the 
history  of  Rome  marked  the  dawn  of  the  era  of  historical 
criticism.  If  Justi  felt  at  liberty  to  spin  historical  formulas 
out  of  his  imagination,  he  was  exercising  a  liberty  which  was  at 
his  time  under  no  serious  ban  of  disrepute. 

It  is  important  to  notice  that  the  word  "republic"  in  Justi's 
vocabulary  is  not  an  anachronism.  It  is  merely  the  unprecise 
term  in  frequent  use  at  the  time  to  denote  any  civic  society.' 

Justi  goes  on  to  say  that: 

People  have  always  been  obliged  to  observe  appropriate  rules 
in  exploiting  their  estates,  and  rulers  of  republics  have  found  them- 
selves constrained  to  adopt  expedient  measures  both  for  organizing 
the  state  and  for  thrift  and  order  in  the  same.  This  is  the  essential 
in  the  economic  and  cameral  sciences. 

Then  Justi  cites  Aristotle  as  evidence  that  theoretical 
treatment  of  these  subjects  was  very  ancient,  and  we  need  not 
challenge  this  phase  of  his  retrospect.  He  proceeds  to  bemoan 
the  neglect  of  this  branch  of  science: 

All  other  sciences  have  workers  in  superabundance.  To  these 
alone  have  they  given  little  thought,  and  if  we  had  not  been  able 
to  collect  certain  practical  observations  from  people  active  in  these 
pursuits,  but  little  devoted  to  learning,  these  sciences  would  be 
everywhere  barren  and  empty.  There  has  been  scarcely  a  thought 
of  teaching  these  sciences  in  the  universities,  and,  although  teachers 

'  Vide  Index,  title  "  Republic."  Justi  applies  the  designation  to  the 
beginnings  of  civic  society,  apparently  making  the  origins  of  the  institu- 
tion of  property  and  of  "republics"  simultaneous,  if  not  identical.  With 
Justi,  as  with  his  predecessors,  the  word  "republic"  was  a  purely  generic 
term  of  the  most  general  application  to  all  sorts  of  civic  societies  in  which 
the  relations  of  meum  and  tuum  had  begun  to  receive  social  sanction. 


296  THE  CAMERALISTS 

in  excess  have  been  provided  for  all  other  branches  of  knowledge, 
centuries  elapsed  after  the  founding  of  these  institutions  before  it 
was  found  necessary  to  devote  a  single  chair  to  these  sciences. 

From  the  following  passage  it  is  probable  that  Justi  used 
the  same  sources  which  we  have  quoted  above  (viz.,  the  books 
of  Gasser  and  Dithmar,  and  possibly  the  tract  of  Ludewig); 
but  his  readers  would  find  no  hint  of  these  means  of  verifying 
his  statements.  For  the  contents  of  the  passage  in  addition  to 
the  data  given  above,  Justi  offers  no  evidence  beyond  his  own 
assertion.     He  says  (Preface,  p.  xii): 

It  was  thirty  years  ago  when  the  former  king  of  Prussia,  who  was 
himself  a  really  great  manager  [irir/A],  who  appraised  learning 
wholly  according  to  its  use  to  the  state,  and  consequently  had  no 
very  high  ideas  of  the  scholars  of  his  time,  set  the  example  of  estab- 
lishing in  his  universities  chairs  devoted  to  the  economic  sciences. 
This  occurred  in  fact  in  Frankfurt  a.  O.  and  in  Halle.  That  at 
Halle  remains;  and  in  this  case  the  king  was  so  fortunate  in  his 
first  appointment  as  to  find  as  an  incumbent  Privy  Counselor 
Gasser,  who  really  had  much  talent  for  these  sciences,  although  he 
did  not  think  with  enough  order  and  system  to  develop  them  thor- 
oughly. The  king  thought  so  much  of  his  teaching  that  a  Prussian 
subject  stood  little  chance  of  promotion  if  he  could  not  show  a 
certificate  from  Gasser  that  he  had  regularly  attended  the  tatter's 
lectures.  This  example  of  the  Prussian  king  at  last  drew  the  atten- 
tion of  other  states  to  the  advantage  of  economic  professorships. 
Similar  chairs  were  accordingly  founded  in  Upsala,  in  Gottingen, 
and  some  other  German  universities,  as  well  as  in  some  academies, 
as  in  Vienna  and  Braunschweig.' 

Justi  expresses  himself  as  highly  dissatisfied  with  the  results 
of  this  movement.  In  the  first  place,  cameralistic  chairs  were 
still  too  rare.     In  the  second  place,  when  they  exist  they  treat 

"  While  Justi  is  literally  correct  about  the  foundation  of  cameralistic 
professorships,  he  overstates  the  neglect  of  these  subjects.  They  were 
treated  more  or  less  formally,  oftener,  however,  on  some  other  than  the 
cameralistic  basis,  by  many  men  in  Germany:  e.  g.,  Gerhard,  as  early 
as  17 13  at  Jena.     For  further  details  vide  Stieda  {vide  p.  306  above). 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  JUSTI  297 

"only  Haushaltungskunst  und  Landwirthschaft  with  less 
incidentally  about  Policey,  and  the  Regalien."  That  is,  to 
express  the  idea  in  today's  idiom,  Justi  regretted  that  the 
emphasis  had  been  placed  on  the  operative  rather  than  on  the 
managerial  side  of  gainful  occupations.  He  supported  this 
judgment  by  referring  to  the  textbooks  which  Gasser  and 
Dithmar  had  published  in  connection  with  their  lectures.* 
These  are  the  only  text-writers  whom  Justi  mentions  here  by 
name,  although  the  vague  reference  to  "others"  shows  that 
he  knew  more  than  he  cared  to  tell  or  was  willing  to  make 
exact,  about  path-breakers  in  the  subject.  Enlarging  upon  the 
criticism  just  quoted,  Justi  declares  (p.  xiii)  that  it  is  mere 
patchwork  to  deal  with  these  fractions  of  Cameralwissenschaft 
and  to  neglect  the  rest. 

Indeed  [he  exclaims],  thanks  to  such  samples,  the  statesmen  and 
practical  cameralists  have  the  idea  that  in  these  sciences  no  orderly 
system  of  theory  is  possible,  and  this  opinion  has  been  uttered  to 
my  face.  On  the  other  hand,  the  students  find  little  that  is  impor- 
tant in  such  books,  but  discover  that  they  have  to  do  mostly  with 
rural  economy,  which  they  expect  to  learn  by  experience,  if  they 
have  occasion  for  it.  They  therefore  look  upon  these  sciences  very 
coldly,  and  conclude  that  they  can  get  along  without  learning  them. 

Justi  adds  that  another  obstacle  in  the  way  of  these  sciences 
is  found  in  the  teachers  themselves.  They  are  apt  to  be  people 
not  trained  for  university  careers,  and  taken  from  the  admin- 
istrative service.    They  accordingly  are  seldom  good  instruct- 

'  Vide  above,  pp.  207  and  223.  He  mentions  Gasser  and  Dith- 
mar again  (Preface,  p.  xliii),  where  he  also  refers  to  "a  new  came- 
ralist"  (vide  p.  309  below).  On  p.  viii  of  the  Preface  to  the  second  edi- 
tion it  appears  that  some  reviewers  had  compared  the  first  edition 
unfavorably  with  Zincke's  Grundriss.  Unless  the  latter  writer  was  the 
"new  cameralist"  referred  to  (and  such  a  phrase  would  have  been  both 
inaccurate  and  insolent),  I  have  no  surmise  about  the  man  intended. 
Justi  takes  up  the  matter  again  in  the  Preface  of  the  second  edition  of 
CrundsiUse  der  Policeywissenschajt  {vide  below,  pp.  437,  438). 


298  THE  CAMERALISTS 

ors  (p.  xiv).  On  the  other  hand,  the  trained  scholars  of  the 
academic  type  who  are  charged  with  teaching  these  subjects 
do  not  know  enough  about  them  in  detail  to  make  their  instruc- 
tion valuable. 

At  the  same  time  Justi  finds  a  brighter  tint  for  the  picture. 
He  thinks  there  is  no  doubt  of  the  superiority  of  the  Prussian 
bureaus  to  those  of  other  states,  and  some  of  this  excellence  is 
due  to  the  teachings  of  Gasser  and  his  colleagues.  The  estab- 
lishment of  cameralistic  chairs  had  also  been  accompanied 
by  more  publication  on  the  subject,  and  in  most  parts  of  Ger- 
many there  had  been  an  evident  increase  of  interest  in  camera- 
listic science.  The  same  appeared  to  be  true  elsewhere,  notably 
in  Sweden,  and  Justi  credits  Sweden  with  more  progress  than 
Germany  in  this  field.  He  draws  the  inference  that  progress 
in  these  respects  would  everywhere  have  been  still  more  credit- 
able if  instruction  in  the  universities  had  been  more  adequate, 
and  the  remainder  of  the  Preface  is  devoted  to  expansion  of 
this  proposition. 

Justi  goes  about  his  task  of  establishing  the  claims  of 
cameralistic  science  in  a  way  that  is  quite  in  accord  with  the 
methodology  of  the  time.  At  first  glance  it  seems  not  unlike 
the  general  argument  of  Adam  Smith.  It  is  impossible,  how- 
ever, not  to  infer  that  the  preliminary  moral  part  of  the  argu- 
ment sits  more  lightly  upon  Justi  than  upon  Smith.  In  the 
case  of  the  former,  it  has  rather  the  effect  of  an  argumentum 
ad  hominem  addressed  to  people  whose  conventional  views 
were  inhospitable  toward  his  subject.  It  attempts  to  show 
on  their  own  grounds  that  cameralism  has  valid  claims.  He 
begins  with  the  proposition  that  there  are  different  kinds  of 
knowledge  appropriate  to  the  different  uses  of  life  (p.  xvi). 
If  we  refuse  to  cultivate  the  kinds  of  knowledge  necessary  for 
the  fulfilment  of  our  diverse  duties,  it  is  just  as  though  we  had 
deliberately  declined  to  perform  the  duties  themselves  (p. 
xvii).    Included  in  this  necessary  knowledge  are  "natural  and 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  JUSTI  299 

revealed  religion,  morals,  or  the  theory  of  virtue,  and  the  science 
of  civic  law,  which  shows  us  our  duties  in  our  various  stations." 

Dividing  knowledge  into  the  "necessary,"  the  "useful," 
and  the  "attractive,"  Justi  urges  that  the  "economic  and 
cameral  sciences"  should  be  recognized  as  belonging  in  the 
first  class.  "They  give  us  precisely  that  insight  which  we  most 
need  for  the  purposes  of  civic  and  social  life  (p.  xix).  The 
government  of  republics  cannot  endure  without  them,  and  there 
is  no  social  institution  or  class  or  mode  of  life  which  could 
do  without  them  entirely." 

Advancing  to  another  premise  of  his  argument,  Justi 
predicates  of  the  universities  as  follows: 

It  will  be  enough  if  we  attend  to  their  ultimate  purpose.  This, 
in  so  far  as  they  are  public  foundations  of  the  state,  can  be  no  other 
than  that  of  aflFording  to  youth  properly  prepared  in  the  lower  schools 
adequate  instruction  in  all  intelligence  and  science  which  will  be 
needful  for  them,  in  order  that  they  may  some  time,  as  servants  of  the 
state  and  upright  citizens,  render  useful  services  to  the  common- 
wealth,' and  be  in  a  position  fully  to  discharge  their  duties  (p.  xx). 
It  follows  from  the  foregoing  reference  to  the  ultimate  purpose  of 
the  universities  that  it  should  be  one  of  their  principal  eflforts  to  teach 
the  economic  and  cameral  sciences  (p.  xxi). 

The  argument  is  then  developed  by  going  into  detail  in  expand- 
ing the  proposition: 

There  are  very  few  positions  of  responsibility  in  the  state  in 
which  expertness  in  the  economic  and  the  cameral  sciences  would 
not  be  the  chief  matter,  if  the  duties  of  the  position  were  fulfilled 
and  good  service  to  the  state  performed  (p.  xxii). 

We  get  something  like  a  direct  view  into  the  state  of  thought 
at  the  time  by  finding  that  it  was  necessary  for  Justi  to  argue 

» I  give  under  protest  this  rendering  to  the  phrase,  "dem  gemeinen 
Wesen."  It  has  no  exact  equivalent  in  our  idiom,  and  must  certainly 
not  be  understood  to  carry  the  associations  which  we  attach  to  the 
expression  that  must  serve  us  as  translation. 


300  THE  CAMERALISTS 

against  the  idea  that,  while  instruction  was  necessary  in  law 
and  medicine,  civil  servants  could  pick  up  casually  all  that 
they  needed  to  know  about  economics  and  cameralistics. 
While  we  have  a  precise  parallel  with  this  situation  in  many 
universities  today  in  the  case  of  sociology,  the  academic  con- 
ditions against  which  Justi  argued  have  been  transferred,  in 
England  and  America  more  than  in  Germany,  to  business  and 
government.  That  is,  the  universities  are  now  eager  to  teach 
these  subjects,  but  the  practical  men  are  skeptical  whether 
the  universities  can  teach  anything  about  them  which  cannot 
be  learned  better  in  practical  life.' 

Justi's  estimate  of  the  part  played  by  knowledge  of  the 
Roman  law  in  German  civilization,  and  as  substitute  for  more 
specific  cameralistics,  is  also  instructive.     He  says  (p.  xxv): 

The  recovery  of  the  Roman  law,  and  provision  for  teaching  it, 
was  the  first  step  which  Providence  allowed  us  to  take,  in  leading 
us  out  of  the  thick  fog  of  ignorance  which  everywhere  surrounded 
us.  We  therefore  owe  deep  gratitude  to  Roman  legal  learning,  and 
it  is  remarkable  that  for  several  centuries  it  was  believed  that  all 
human  wisdom  was  to  be  found  in  the  body  of  Roman  laws.  To 
knowledge  of  these  laws  it  was  chiefly  due  that  we  became  intelligent 
enough  to  begin  the  extermination  of  barbarism.  Today's  fortunate 
organization  of  states  according  to  the  fundamental  principles  of 
economic  and  camcral  science  is  by  no  means  old.  Less  than  two 
hundred  years  ago  there  was  no  knowledge  of  a  cameral  system  in 
Germany,  and  at  that  time  men  could  scarcely  have  believed  that 
the  prosperity  [Aujnahme^]  of  the  trading  classes,  the  encouragement 
of  the  classes  producing  raw  material,  and  the  administration  of  the 
revenues  of  the  sovereign  could  occur  in  accordance  with  permanent 
principles  and  methods.  Consequently  nothing  was  known  of 
cameralists.  The  most  eminent  magistrates  [J uslizbcdicnlen]  of  the 
prince  at  the  same  time  managed  his  revenues;  or  the  matter  was 

«  Vide  Spencer's  argument  in  The  Study  of  Sociology. 
»  This  is  one  of  the  ambiguous  terms  which  a  Hteral   translation 
would  not  fairly  render. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  JUSTI  301 

held  to  be  of  such  slight  account  that  the  consort  of  the  prince  took 
charge  of  it,  just  as  today  the  spouse  of  a  well-to-do  private  person 
manages  his  household.  The  good  arrangements  in  the  police  and 
other  bureaus,  which  we  now  find  in  most  states,  came  only  gradually 
into  being,  perhaps  more  through  accidental  suggestions  than  in 
pursuance  of  coherent  principles  of  the  governmental  sciences. 
The  organization  of  states  is  itself  perhaps  not  yet  brought  to  per- 
fection, and  perhaps  it  is  only  a  beneficent  fruit  of  our  enlightened 
century  that  we  at  last  perceive  that  the  great  housekeeping  [Wirth- 
schaft]  of  the  state,  in  all  its  economic,  police,  and  cameral  institu- 
tions, rests  upon  coherent  principles,  which  are  derived  from  the 
nature  of  republics,  and  incidentally  are  veritable  sciences. 

Justi  at  once  reiterates  the  moral  that  these  sciences  are 
now  worked  out  in  somewhat  complete  shape,  and  conse- 
quently it  would  be  a  dereliction  in  high  places  if  there  should 
be  further  delay  in  making  them  the  subject-matter  of  univer- 
sity instruction  (p.  xxvii). 

One  of  the  passages  in  the  Preface  indicates  that  Justi's 
idea  of  cameral  science  pictured  it  as  a  social  polytechnic,  and 
the  cameralist  as  an  all-around  expert  in  this  complex  science 
of  government.    Thus  he  says  (p.  xxxi): 

We  may  admit,  to  be  sure,  that  a  merely  practical  cameralist, 
if  he  has  good  natural  intelligence,  and  industriously  makes  himself 
acquainted  with  the  institutions  of  other  lands,  may  become  a  good 
particular  cameralist  (sic)  in  this  or  that  branch  of  civic  adminis- 
tration, but  he  can  never  become  a  good  universal  cameralist  (sic). 
From  lack  of  coherent  basic  principles  he  will  never  walk  with  secure 
steps.  At  every  unusual  occurrence  he  will  waver  and  seize  upon 
questionable  decisions.  If  he  thinks  he  has  introduced  important 
improvements  in  this  part  of  the  administrative  organization,  he 
will  at  last  come  to  the  perception  that  he  has  thereby  caused  dis- 
proportionate injury  in  another  part  of  the  great  housekeeping  of  the 
state,  because  he  did  not  sufficiently  understand  the  correlation  of 
this  great  system  and  the  influence  which  all  circumstances  of  the 
entire  system  have  upon  one  another.  What  can  however  be  more 
indispensable  to  a  state  than  perfect  universal  cameralists?    The 


302  THE  CAMERALISTS 

welfare  of  the  state  rests  heavily  upon  them.     Most  lands  appear 
in  this  respect  to  be  seriously  lacking.' 

Justi  frankly  {)uts  the  sciences  of  civic  administration,  as 
professed  technologies,  in  direct  antithesis  with  "the  other 
sciences  which  merely  serve  to  enlarge  the  human  under- 
standing" (p.  xxxiii).  He  urges,  however,  against  the  con- 
trary opinion  of  some  scholars,  that  the  former  would  not 
interfere  with  the  latter,  but  on  the  contrary,  "the  more  we 
discharge  and  respect  our  duties  to  the  state,  the  more  shall 
we  be  inclined  to  improve  our  understanding." 

But  Justi  is  not  content  with  arguing  that  the  universities 
should  undertake  instruction  in  cameralistics.  His  argument 
is  so  cogent  in  his  own  mind  that  it  carries  him  much  beyond 
his  premises.  Apparently  inflamed  by  a  zeal  that  is  kindled 
in  the  course  of  his  discussion,  he  demands  still  wider  scope 
for  his  science.  He  concludes  the  first  branch  of  his  arugment 
as  follows  (p.  xxxiv) : 

In  my  opinion  I  have  sufficiently  shown  that  it  is  necessary  to 
teach  the  economic  and  camcralistic  sciences  in  the  universities. 
This  theorem  has  the  corollary  that  we  must  prepare  youth  for  such 
instruction  in  the  lower  schools,  and  there  can  be  no  dou\)t  that  every 
new  academic  citizen'  should  bring  with  him  at  least  the  general 
theories  of  Haushaltungskunst^  as  the  basis  for  all  the  sciences 
which  are  necessary  for  promoting  the  great  liousekccping  of  the 
state.  Indeed,  in  the  very  meanest  schools,  in  which  the  children 
of  the  lowest  rabble  arc  instructed,  at  least  the  most  comprehensible 
precepts  should  be  taught,  and  the  duties  which  they  at  some  time, 
as  citizens  and  inhabitants  of  the  state,  and  as  fathers  of  families, 
will  have  to  observe.  In  the  case  of  institutions  of  this  class,  we 
seem  never  to  have  thought  that  it  is  not  less  needful  to  educate  good 
and  useful  citizens  than  good  Christians. 

»  The  rest  of  the  paragraph  (p.  xxxii)  reads  like  a  memorandum  for 
Spencer's  The  Sins  of  Legislators. 

*  I.  e.,  every  matriculant  at  the  university. 

3  Without  trying  to  make  too  much  of  it,  we  may  notice  that  he  uses 
the  art  rather  than  the  science  concept. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  JUSTI  303 

Justi  then  passes  to  a  second  consideration,  viz.,  the  proper 
organization  of  cameraiistic  instruction.  His  pnjposal  is 
worth  quoting  at  length  (pp.  xxxv  ff .) : 

It  will  hardly  be  supposed  that  I  should  regard  a  single  man  as 
sufficient  to  teach  the  economic  and  cameraiistic  sciences  in  univer- 
sities. At  le^st  two  teachers  should  he  appointed,  of  whom  the  one 
should  deal  chiefly  with  police  and  commercial  science,  the  other 
with  economics  and  finance.  For  if  these  sciences  arc  to  Ix;  taught 
completely,  fundamentally  and  to  real  purpo.se,  each  of  these  profes- 
sors must  have  time  to  treat  of  this  or  that  portion  of  his  sciences 
in  detail  in  separate  courses  of  lectures,  in  order  that  each  may  have 
opportunity  to  make  himself  proficient  in  that  branch  to  which  he 
proposes  to  devote  himself.  Some  will  want  to  make  a  career  in  the 
manufacturing  system,  some  in  the  bureaus  of  taxation  and  revenue, 
some  in  forestry,  or  the  forestry  bureau,  and  all  must  have  oppor- 
tunity to  get  detailed  instruction  in  the  selected  specialty. 

The  traditional  professorship  of  politics  in  the  universities  should 
be  so  filled  that  future  ambassadors  and  ministers  could  profitably 
hear  the  occupant  discuss  statesmanship,  and  so  that  the  doctrines 
taught  would  not  seem  ridiculous  to  actual  ministers  and  statesmen. 
The  professor  of  chemistry  should  be  of  such  a  character  that  he 
would  be  prepared  to  teach  Probicr-  und  Schmelzkunsl,  and  should 
not  give  his  time  merely  to  the  theory  of  compounding  medicines, 
which  any  apothecary's  boy  can  learn  without  trouble.  Likewise, 
the  teacher  of  mechanics  should  be  prepared  to  explain  the  machinery 
of  mining  operation  and  construction,  and  the  professor  of  natural 
science  [Naturkunde]  should  be  able  to  impart  adequate  knowledge 
of  ores  and  of  fossils  in  general.  These  six  professors,  to  whom  we 
might  add  the  professor  of  civil  and  military  engineering  [burger- 
lichen  und  Kriegsbaukunst],  if  talented,  experienced,  and  expert  men 
were  chosen,  would  compose  a  faculty  that  would  ix?  uncommonly 
salutary  for  civic  life.  It  would  amount  to  an  oracle  which  could 
with  great  advantage  be  called  upon  in  many  affairs  of  state  for 
which  it  is  now  often  necessary,  at  great  cost,  to  procure  advisers 
from  foreign  countries. 

In  respect  to  instruction  in  the  economic  and  cameral  sciences, 
there  is  first  of  all  needed  a  Collegium  Fundanientale,  in  which  all 


304  THE  CAMERALISTS 

these  sciences  are  presented  in  a  single  coherent  theory.  This  is 
necessary  in  order  that  young  students  may  get  an  insight  into  the 
whole,  that  they  may  gain  a  coherent  idea  of  all  contrivances  in  the 
great  housekeeping  of  the  state,  ai^  may  be  filled  with  correct 
principles  derived  from  the  nature  of  republics.  When  they  have 
laid  such  a  ground  they  will  never  be  entire  strangers  in  any  part  of 
the  housekeeping  of  the  state,  although  it  may  be  their  intention  to 
emphasize  some  particular  part  of  civic  administration.  This  will 
under  all  circumstances  accrue  to  their  advantage,  because  all 
affairs  of  state  have  an  inseparable  influence  upon  one  another  and 
an  interconnection  with  one  another.  This  course  should  properly 
be  heard  by  every  student,  unless  he  is  determined  not  to  become  a 
member  of  the  civic  organization.  Should  we  not  get  acquainted 
with  the  structure  and  nature  of  the  civic  body  in  which  we  live  ? 
Should  we  not  make  ourselves  acquainted  with  our  obligations 
toward  the  republic,  and  is  there  a  scholar  to  be  found  who  does 
not  need  at  least  the  rules  of  Haushaltungskunst  ? 

The  many-colored  naivete  of  this  passage  gives  it  a  high 
value.  The  cross-lights  upon  the  state  of  knowledge  in  general, 
though  not  directly  in  the  line  of  our  inquiry,  are  altogether 
worthy  of  attention.  The  observation  most  immediately 
pertinent  is  that,  although  Justi's  range  of  effective  vision 
covered  only  the  operations  of  a  system  of  bureaus  developed 
in  the  service  of  an  obstinately  statical  type  of  state,  yet  the 
soul  of  truth  in  his  contention  has  gone  marching  on.  We 
now  see  that  adequate  social  science  presupposes  analysis  of 
all  the  processes  within  which  government  is  a  mediate  process, 
until  we  have  a  survey  of  the  whole  cosmos  of  human  purposes 
in  the  whole  complexity  of  their  activities.  In  other  words, 
we  have  here  an  outcropping  of  the  social  logic  which  had  never 
been  generalized  in  its  present  form  until  the  last  half-century. 
The  perception  that  we  need  to  understand  the  social  activities 
of  which  we  are  factors  permits  no  stopping-place  until  we  have 
compassed  the  whole  range  of  activities  within  which  there 
are  traceable  connections  of  cause  and  effect  in  human  lives. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  JUSTI  305 

Our  primary  interest  with  the  cameralists,  however,  is  in 
tracing  the  progress  from  their  preoccupation  with  a  mere 
administrative  technology  to  an  economic  theory  which  would 
have  the  same  relation  to  such  technology  that  the  science  of 
physics  has  to  civil  engineering. 

Justi  goes  on  to  say  (p.  xxxvii)  that  the  first  part  of  his 
Staatswirthschaft  is  for  use  as  a  textbook  in  such  a  Collegium 
Fundamentale. 

It  contains  in  a  coherent  system  the  chief  principles  of  all  eco- 
nomic sciences.  First  of  all  the  chief  theorems  of  statecraft  [Staats- 
kunst^]  are  presented.  Then  the  police  administration  is  explained, 
which  in  a  broad  sense  includes  the  science  of  commerce.  These 
two  sciences  occupy  the  first  book.  The  second  book  teaches 
principally  the  immediate  duties  of  subjects,  in  which  duties  are 
involved  the  grounds  of  financial  science,  and  then  follow  the  general 
rules  of  management,  with  the  chief  theorems  of  agricultural  science. 

Justi  thinks  that  this  part  of  the  book  can  be  covered  in  the 
university  in  a  semester  (p.  xxxviii). 

This  fundamental  course  taken  for  granted  as  an  intro- 
duction, Justi  would  proceed  to  develop  the  involved  particular 
sciences.  First  of  these  he  says  is  ^^Oekonomie"  and  the  term 
is  thus  put  in  the  place  of  a  specific  designation  under  the 
generic  terms  ^^Staatskunst"  ^* Staatswirthschaft"  ^^Haus- 
haltungskunst,"  etc.  Justi  at  once  explains  his  use  of  the 
title  "Oekonomie'': 

It  includes  not  only  the  general  rules  of  management  [Haus- 
haltung],  but  also  the  theory  of  municipal  management,  and  especially 

'  The  undifferentiated  conception  of  which  the  word  was  a  symbol 
at  that  time  cannot  be  indicated  by  any  English  word  now  in  use.  The 
rendering  "statecraft"  does  not  quite  correspond  with  Justi's  idea,  yet 
it  would  be  more  unfair  to  use  the  modern  term  "political  science." 
In  the  rough,  Staatskunst  as  Justi  knew  it,  was  the  methods  of  keeping 
the  civic  machinery  running  and  of  assuring  the  ways  and  means  on  which 
the  machinery  depended;  including,  however,  much  more  management 
of  private  affairs  than  Americans  or  Englishmen  would  admit  into 
political  science. 


3o6  THE  CAMERALISTS 

of  agricultural  management.  It  is  necessary  to  begin  the  special 
sciences  with  these  two,  because  they  in  turn  are  fundamental  in 
this  field  (p.  xxxviii). 

Again  we  must  make  the  comment  that  the  apparent  validity 
of  this  position  is  shaken  by  the  fact  that  the  '^Oekonomie," 
as  Justi  knew  it,  was  systematized  rule-of-lhumb.  It  was  the 
procedure  which  had  become  the  routine  of  the  traditional 
bureaucratic  state.  Its  foundation  was  the  sand  of  assumption 
that  this  state  was  the  universal  state.  "Oekonomie"  was  thus 
essentially  stereotyped  usage,  while  "political  economy"  as 
proposed  by  Adam  Smith  was  essentially  an  inquiry  into  prin- 
ciples of  economic  relationship  antecedent  to  usage,  and 
destined  to  control  usage.  We  must  admit  that  usage  on  a 
different  plane  set  bounds  to  Smith's  objective  analysis,'  yet 
the  contrast  between  the  two  systems  was  at  bottom  this: 
Justi  was  formulating  usage.  Smith  was  referring  usage  to 
underlying  principles.  Each  procedure  had  justification  after 
its  kind.  Neither  procedure  has  yet  come  to  its  full  fruition. 
On  each  side  criticism  has  both  brought  out  incompleteness 
and  found  approach  to  correlation  with  the  opposite  procedure.' 

Of  this  first  fundamental  science  of  the  second  order, 
"Oekonomie"  Justi  adds  (p.  xxxviii): 

It  not  only  affords  adequate  ideas  of  the  subject-matter  con- 
cerned in  all  these  specific  sciences,  but  its  theorems  are  at  the  same 
time  an  epitome  of  all  the  measures  which  are  necessary  in  the  great 
management  of  the  state.  The  great  management  of  the  state  rests 
virtually  upon  the  same  rules  which  other  management  must  observe.' 

'  Vide  Small,  Adam  Smith  and  Modern  Sociology,  pp.  56,  107,  125, 
148,  160,  etc. 

>  This  passage  contains  a  part  of  the  reply  which  I  would  make  to 
FrensflorfTs  generalization.     Vide  above,  p.  290. 

.1  While  this  proposition  suggests  the  remark  which  Herbert  Sf>encer 
somewhere  makes,  to  the  effect  that  "the  problems  of  the  state  are  merely 
the  prf)l)lcms  of  the  household  enlarged  and  extended,"  the  inferences 
drawn  by  the  two  men  from  the  same  generalization  were  quite  con- 
tradictory. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  JUSTI  307 

In  both  establishments  the  ultimate  purrx)ses  are  to  aaiuire  "means" 
[Vermogen],  to  assure  what  has  been  acquired,  and  to  use  reasonably 
the  goods  possessed.  The  housekeeping  of  the  state  is  merely  of 
incomparably  greater  extent  than  that  of  a  private  person.  A 
student  who  wants  to  learn  the  economic  and  cameral  sciences 
thoroughly,  and  at  the  same  time  wishes  to  end  his  studies  early, 
might  therefore  hear  the  Ockonomie  while  also  hearing  the  Col- 
legium Fundameniale,  yet  it  would  always  be  better  if  he  would  begin 
the  more  special  courses  after  completing  the  more  general.  The 
course  on  Oekonomie  may  also  easily  be  completed  in  a  semester. 

Next  to  the  economic  lectures  [continues  Justi]  should  follow 
in  order  the  course  on  police  science.  This  is  also  the  first  part  of 
the  great  Oekonomie  (sic)  of  the  state,  since  it  includes  the  chief 
measures  intended  to  preserve  and  increase  the  general  means  of 
the  republic.  All  the  methods  whereby  the  riches  of  the  state  may 
be  increased,  in  so  far  as  the  authority  of  the  government  is  con- 
cerned, belong  consequently  (sic)  under  the  charge  of  the  police.' 
The  science  of  police  is  consequently  the  more  immediate  basis  for 
the  cameral  anrl  finance  sciences  proper,  and  the  expert  in  police 
science  must  sow,  as  it  were,  in  order  that  the  cameralist  in  turn 
may  reap.  Since  this  science  is  very  comprehensive,  the  lectures  on 
it  will  demand  a  whole  year,  if  one  treats  the  subjects  involved  with 
the  proper  thoroughness  and  completeness. 

Then  cameral  and  financial  science  proper  completes  the  series. 
This  is,  as  it  were,  the  second  main  division  of  the  great  Oekonomie 
of  a  republic,  since  it  deals  with  the  reasonable  use  of  the  means  of 

the  state,  and  the  entire  internal  housekeeping This  science 

also  is  so  inclusive  that  it  can  hardly  be  covered  properly  in  less 
than  a  whole  year. 

All  these  sciences  are  demanded  if  one  is  to  attain  thorough 
knowledge  of  them,  and  to  become  a  universal  cameralist.  But  if 
one  is  destined  to  become  only  a  particular  cameralist,  one  or  the 
other  of  these  sciences  may,  if  necessary,  be  dispensed  with.  For 
instance,  one  who  purposes  to  give  his  attention  chiefly  to  the  com- 

»  The  "consequently"  is  obviously  a  term  of  reasoning  in  a  circle. 
But  why  call  attention  to  a  spot  on  the  outside  of  this  cup  and  platter, 
while  the  whole  contents  were  a  ragout  of  begged  questions  ? 


3o8  THE  CAMERALISTS 

mercial  system  may  omit  the  Oekonomie  and  Canieralwissenschafl, 
and  after  the  Collegium  Fundamentale  may  turn  immediately  to 
police  science,  etc.  (p.  xl). 

Another  specification  shows  that  Justi's  perceptions  were 
in  more  than  one  direction  prophetic.     He  adds  (p.  xl): 

It  is  not  to  be  denied  that  it  would  be  of  great  advantage  if  one 
would  begin  this  study  with  a  course  on  the  history  of  the  police, 
commercial,  economic,  cameralistic  systems.  This  sort  of  history, 
however,  is  not  yet  at  all  worked  out,  with  the  exception  of  a  slight 
beginning  at  Berlin,  and  there  is  a  special  lack  of  a  suitable  text- 
book for  this  purpose.  Meanwhile,  each  of  the  above-scheduled 
courses  should  begin  with  a  brief  history  of  the  subject.  Thus  in 
the  lectures  on  police  one  may  introduce  a  discourse  on  the  police 
arrangements  of  ancient  times,  and  of  the  rise  and  fall  of  countries 
and  cities;  in  commercial  science  one  may  rehearse  the  history  of 
shipping  and  trade,  and  similarly  in  the  case  of  the  other  sciences. 

The  technological  and  vocational  trend  of  Justi's  ideas  is 
more  evident  than  before  in  the  paragraph  in  which  he  begins 
to  discuss  the  limitations  under  which  instruction  in  these 
sciences  must  proceed.  His  first  proposition  may  be  rendered 
in  modem  academic  jargon,  "It  is  of  course  impossible  to 
conduct  these  courses  by  the  laboratory  method"  (p.  xli). 
And  he  continues: 

For  in  these  sciences  practice  would  not  amount  to  much  if  it 
consisted  in  preparing  cameral  documents  or  acting  as  a  commission 
in  cameral  affairs.  That  is  perhaps  not  the  hundredth  part  of  the 
practical  labors  in  these  sciences.  In  the  case  of  each  main  division 
there  are  numerous  side  applications.  If  one  were  to  give  specially 
practical  lectures,  one  would  be  drawn  into  repetition  of  exposition 
and  explanation  which  would  amount  to  a  review  of  the  whole  body 
of  science,  and  a  series  of  years  would  not  suffice  for  such  a  course. 
Consequently  every  course  on  a  special  economic  science  must  be 
planned  in  a  practical  way,  especially  the  courses  on  police,  commerce, 
and  finance,  and  so  soon  as  the  instruction  has  reached  the  end  of 
a  main  division  the  instructor  must  exhibit  pieces  of  work  of  the  sort 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  JUSTI  309 

that  apply  what  has  been  explained.  He  must  require  the  students  to 
imitate  these  samples,  and  he  must  pass  judgment  on  them  publicly. 
This  should  be  the  practice  at  least  with  the  more  diligent  students, 
who  have  an  interest  in  getting  thorough  mastery  of  the  subject. 
It  would  be  impossible  to  treat  in  this  way  all  the  exercises  that 
might  be  submitted.' 

At  the  close  of  the  Preface  (p.  xliii)  Justi  again  refers  to 
Gasser  and  Dithmar,  and  expresses  the  hope  that  his  work 
will  be  found  superior  to  theirs.  He  thinks  these  latter  are  too 
defective  to  be  used  with  advantage.  Then  occurs  the  phrase, 
"a  new  cameraiist,"  already  noted.  Justi  says  that  so  far  as 
extent  of  material  is  concerned  this  writer  is  measurably  com- 
plete. "But  it  would  not  be  in  accordance  with  the  truth  if 
one  should  attribute  to  his  work  an  organization  firmly  based 
upon  the  essence  of  the  subject." 

In  the  Preface  to  the  second  edition,  less  than  three  years 
later  than  the  first,  Justi  says  that  the  first  edition  was  exhausted 
a  year  and  a  half  before  the  time  of  writing. 

He  betrays  a  rather  innocent  idea  of  the  growth  of  science, 
when,  in  apology  for  enlarging  Part  I,  he  says  that  an  author 
ought  not  to  publish  a  book  until  he  has  reached  his  limit  of 
ability  to  treat  the  subject,  so  that  changes  will  not  be  necessary 
in  later  editions.  He  ought  at  most  to  publish  additions  as 
app)endices,  but  in  separate  sheets,  so  that  the  owner  of  the 
first  edition  could  use  them  with  it.  He  conformed  to  this 
requirement  in  part  by  making  the  changes  chiefly  in  the 
notes  (p.  iv).' 

Before  entering  upon  an  analysis  of  the  text  of  Staats- 
wirthschajt,  mention  must  be  made  of  the  syllabus  which 

*  As  an  item  of  evidence  bearing  on  the  growth  of  the  seminar 
method  in  German  universities,  sec.  xlii  is  worth  consulting. 

*  Sees,  vi-ix  of  this  preface  contain  curious  circumstantial  evidence 
about  the  author's  attitude  toward  other  writers,  and  about  the  sort  of 
Ubeity  which  a  commentator  on  political  subjects  might  at  that  time 
MMime. 


310  THE  CAMERALISTS 

preceded  it.  The  main  outline  is  identical  with  that  of  Slaats- 
wirthscha/t,  and  the  latter  evidently  incorporated  the  sub- 
stance of  the  lectures  given  on  the  basis  of  the  former.  The 
most  notable  feature  of  this  outline  is  the  prompt  and  definite 
statement  of  its  fundamental  thesis:  viz.,  after  declaring 
(§2)  that  the  ultimate  purpose  [Endzweck]  of  the  economic  and 
cameral  sciences  is  the  common  happiness  [gemeinschafUiche 
GlUckseligkeit],  Justi  declares  (§3): 

Hence  follows  the  first  and  universal  principle,  namely:  all  the 
governmental  activities  of  a  state  must  be  so  ordered  that  by  means 
of  them  the  happiness  of  the  state  may  be  promoted. 

Our  interpretation  of  this  principle  must  be  deferred.^ 

In  accordance  with  his  theory,  Justi  begins  Staatswirthschaft 
with  a  "short  history"  of  the  financial  systems  and  commerce 
of  all  i)eoples.  It  occupies  twenty-six  pages.  The  status  of 
its  historicity  may  be  inferred  from  a  note  on  the  second  page, 
in  which  Whiston's  estimate  of  the  population  of  the  ante- 
diluvian world  is  cited  as  proof  that  navigation  must  have  been 
practiced  during  that  ei)och,  because  without  it  a  population 
twenty  times  as  numerous  as  that  of  the  modern  world  could 
not  have  been  su[)ported! 

'  Vide  p.  319.  The  syllabus  is  entitled:  Kurier  systemaiischer 
Crutulriss  oiler  Oeconomischen  und  Cameralwissenschaften.  It  is 
reprinted  in  Justi's  Gesam.  Pol.  u.  Finanzschri/ten,  Vol.  I,  Abth.  2, 
pp.  504-73;  and  in  Vol.  II,  Abth.  2,  pp.  303-77.  A  note  to  §2  says: 
"I  used  this  outline  as  the  basis  of  my  lectures  at  Vienna,  and  it  had  to 
\tc  submitted  to  the  previous  censorship  of  the  ministry.  Graf  von 
Haugwitz  was  so  much  plca.scd  with  it  that  he  caused  it  to  be  circulated 
among  all  the  meml)ers  of  the  Ceneral-directorii."  This  seems  to  settle 
the  case  with  Roscher  as  to  Justi's  academic  activities  at  Vienna.  Vide 
aVK)ve,  p.  289. 

Both  in  the  essay  referred  to  above  (p.  286)  and  in  the  Ceschichte 
(p.  444)  Roscher  says  that  Slaatswirlhscha/t  was  dedicated  to  Maria 
Thcrcsia.  Frcnstlorfl  (p.  385)  assumes  that  such  was  the  fact.  I  have 
been  unable  to  find  a  copy  of  the  first  edition,  but  have  used  the  second 
(1758).     My  copy  seems  to  be  in  the  original  binding,  but  it  contains  no 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  JUSTI  311 

The  character  of  the  historical  propositions  is  seen  in  the 
following  samples: 

The  Phoenicians  carried  on  extensive  trade  both  on  land  and 
sea;  ....  because  her  finances  were  not  well  administered,  this 
powerful  republic  in  consequence,  and  also  because  of  party  spirit, 
at  last  suffered  total  destruction;  ....  there  were  at  the  time  [of 
the  first  Ptolemies]  in  Egypt  33,339  flourishing  cities  (p.  7);  ...  . 
the  Romans,  as  the  rest  of  their  constitution  was  wise  and  excellent, 
had  also  a  well -ordered  constitution  of  the  financial  system  (p.  7),  etc. 

Justi  mentions  Livy,  Josephus,  Suetonius,  the  Capitularies, 
etc.,  but  not  in  a  way  which  shows  whether  he  had  first-hand 
acquaintance  with  them.  The  notes  do  not  furnish  evidence 
of  the  authorities  behind  the  statements  in  the  text,  but  add 
illustrative  or  cumulative  material  backed  by  nothing  but  the 
author's  assertion. 

In  the  sixth  section  (p.  10)  Justi  declares: 

The  Roman  commerce  declined,  just  as  this  realm  tended  toward 
its  fall,  on  account  of  the  bad  administration  of  the  emperor;  and 
although  the  Roman  Empire  in  the  Orient,  especially  in  Constanti- 
nople, in  the  beginning  had  a  considerable  trade,  yet  this  declined 
in  proportion  as  the  realm  was  weakened  by  the  Arabians  or  Sara- 
dedication  whatever.  The  same  is  true  of  other  copies  of  the  same  edition 
on  which  I  have  obtained  reports  from  libraries  in  this  country.  As  the 
Preface  to  the  first  edition  was  dated  "Leipzig  11  April,  1755,"  i-  e.,  in 
the  second  year  after  Justi  left  Vienna,  it  does  not  accord  with  the  cir- 
cumstances of  his  departure,  so  far  as  theyare  understood,  to  suppose  that 
he  would  have  been  in  a  state  of  mind  to  waste  any  veneration  on  the  em- 
press. Roscher  seems  to  have  been  in  error  about  the  dedication.  It  is  pos- 
sible thatthe  original  of  the  Crundriss  may  have  been  dedicated  to  Maria 
Theresia,  and  that  Roscher  confused  the  syllabus  with  the  expanded  work. 

After  the  foregoing  was  written  I  received  the  following  from  the 
library  of  the  British  Museum:  "The  first  ed.  of  Justi's  Staatswirthschaft 
(1755)  is  in  B.  M.  and  is  dedicated  to  Maria  Teresia.  His  Kurzer  sysle- 
matischer  Gfundriss  (1752  ?)  is  not  in  B.  M."  This  puts  Roscher  right; 
but  it  also  shows  that  he  missed  the  significance  of  the  omission  in  the 
second  editionv 


312  THE  CAMERALISTS 

cens.    On  the  other  hand  all  commerce  passed  over  to  these  peoples, 
especially  after  they  had  conquered  Egypt. 

Then  in  a  note  upon  this  paragraph  Justi  continues: 

Not  the  division  of  the  Empire,  as  many  writers  on  history 
believe,  caused  the  fall  of  Rome,  for  both  empires  remained  after  the 
division  stronger  than  the  most  powerful  realms.  We  must  seek 
the  true  cause  of  the  fall  of  both  empires  in  the  insecure  occupancy 
of  the  throne  and  in  the  irregular  succession,  etc. 

These  platitudes  and  generalities  are  below  the  standards 
of  a  modem  "finishing  school."  They  arc  mere  space-fillers 
in  a  book  ostensibly  introducing  young  men  to  practical  govern- 
mental careers.  It  is  hard  to  believe  that  they  could  have  been 
regarded  by  their  author  as  more  than  rhetorical  flourishes. 

Coming  to  the  period  of  discovery  and  colonization,  the 
information  vouchsafed  contains  this  item  concerning  the 
English  jx)ssessions  in  America: 

They  possessed  there  Virginia,  Carolina,  New  England,  Scot- 
land (sic)  besides  several  other  lands  and  islands  (p.  17). 

The  more  serious  and  practical  purpose  of  the  book  might 
be  inferred,  perhaps,  from  the  points  to  which  Justi  calls 
attention  in  the  case  of  Germany.     He  says  (p.  24):  _,^ 

In  respect  to  the  finances,  Germany  has  been  very  careless  for 
several  hundred  years.  Only  at  the  end  of  the  last  century  were 
manufactures  to  some  extent  re-established  through  the  Protestant 
French  refugees,  and  the  former  king  of  Prussia,  who  was  himself 
a  very  great  administrator  [Haushalter],  by  good  management, 
increased  his  revenues  by  one-half,  and  he  gave  equal  attention  to 
manufactures.  The  present  great  and  wise  Prussian  monarch  has 
not  only  retained  the  former  management,  but  by  forming  great 
maritime  trading  societies  he  has  laid  the  foundations  for  sea  com- 
merce, etc. 

A  note  to  this  paragraph  declares: 

In  the  Middle  Ages,  when  almost  all  the  revenues  of  the  German 
princes  were  derived  from  the  crown  estates,  which  produced  little 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  JUSTI  313 

enough,  as  a  rule  the  consort  of  the  prince,  or  the  prince  himself, 
took  charge  both  of  the  income  and  of  the  expenditure,  without  the 
help  of  bureau  employees.  In  modem  times,  and  even  within  200 
years,  questions  of  justice  and  finance,  neither  of  which  bulked  very 
large,  were  dealt  with  by  one  and  the  same  body  of  officials.  Land- 
grave Philipp  of  Hesse,  as  appears  from  his  will,  had  for  all  his  admin- 
istration two  dignified  officials,  each  of  whom  received  fifty  florins 
salary.  Elector  August  of  Saxony  (1526-86)  is,  so  far  as  I  know, 
the  first  of  the  German  princes  to  have  organized  an  orderly  cameral 
system. 

So  far  as  a  serious  scientific  or  practical  purpose  may  be 
supposed  to  have  stimulated  this  "historical"  survey,  so  far 
as  it  is  to  be  regarded  as  something  more  than  a  mere  rhetorical 
embellishment,  there  appears  to  be  but  one  object  which  it 
can  have  served.  It  advertised  the  importance  of  adminis- 
trative thrift.  It  did  this  not  by  analysis  of  cause  and  effect 
which  was  above  the  grade  of  puerility,  but  merely  by  calling 
attention  to  the  matter-of-fact  elements  of  ways  and  means 
which  romantic  or  speculative  or  heedless  tradition  had  formed 
the  habit  of  neglecting.  Perhaps  the  present  state  of  mind 
in  the  United  States  on  the  subject  of  forestry  may  be  cited 
as  the  most  instructive  parallel.  Until  very  recently  it  was 
almost  impossible  to  make  anyone  of  the  academic  or  of  the 
political  type  take  the  slightest  interest  in  the  subject  of  forest 
preservation.  It  was  regarded  as  a  matter  that  would  take 
care  of  itself,  or  if  not,  it  was  no  concern  of  people  whose  chief 
interest  was  in  taking  care  of  themselves.  Justi's  public  was 
in  a  somewhat  similar  state  of  mind  about  national  revenues. 
Evidently  there  was  a  reason  for  this  in  the  fact  that  public 
revenues  were  not  in  the  same  sense  "public"  that  they  are 
today.  They  were  the  revenues  of  the  prince  and  of  his 
government.  While  there  had  been  great  changes  in  the 
technique  of  administration,  and  while  the  problems  of  pro- 
ductiveness of  different  sources  of  revenue  had  been  system- 
atically calculated  by  the  governmental  bureaus,  it  was  about 


3M  THE  CAMERALISTS 

as  hard,  apparently,  to  create  non-official  interest  in  these 
subjects,  as  with  us  at  present  in  the  subject  of  forestry.  People 
then  said,  "It  is  the  prince's  affair;  let  him  look  out  for  it;" 
just  as  we  now  say,  "What  has  posterity  done  for  us?  Let 
future  generations  look  out  for  themselves."  Accordingly, 
this  historical  retrospect,  utterly  without  value  as  a  contribution 
to  knowledge,  for  it  was  merely  a  recital  of  scrappy  hearsay, 
was  a  bit  of  homiletical  practice.  It  was  an  appeal  to  the 
suggestibility  of  hearers,  and  an  attempt  to  put  them  into  a 
receptive  attitude  toward  the  technological  considerations  which 
were  to  follow. 


CHAPTER  XIV 
ARGUMENT  OF  JUSTI'S  "  STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT  " 

It  is  now  in  order  to  summarize  Justi's  epitome  of  cameral 
science,  not  with  reference  to  its  technological  details,  but 
especially  with  a  view  to  the  larger  scheme  of  purposes  which 
these  details,  and  cameralism  as  a  whole,  presupposed.  In 
this  r^sum^  much  reappears  that  has  been  said  or  implied 
either  by  Justi  or  his  predecessors. 

The  argument  begins  with  assertion  of  the  necessity  of  starting 
the  teaching  of  any  science  by  laying  down  fundamental  principles 
(p.  29),  as  distinguished  from  the  programmes  of  teaching  merely 
through  examples,  or  practice,  or  memory. 

The  importance  of  basing  a  system  of  teaching  on  principles  is 
peculiarly  evident  in  cameralistics  (p.  30).  The  forethought  of 
a  wise  government  must  extend  to  a  thousand  sorts  of  matters  which 
are  most  intimately  connected  with  one  another.  If  then  one  lacks 
a  general  and  connected  idea  of  these  governmental  affairs,  one  will 
in  many  ways  cause  injury  to  the  body  politic  [gemeines  Wesen], 
when  one  attempts  to  be  of  use. 

Again  Justi  implies,  without  dogmatically  asserting  it, 
that  these  affairs  of  state  have  never  yet  been  treated  in  a 
single  book  as  details  growing  out  of  fundamental  principles. 
His  note  on  this  proposition  still  more  clearly  reflects  the 
situation  as  he  saw  it.    He  says  (p.  31): 

We  cannot  assert,  to  be  sure,  that  there  has  been  a  lack  of  books 
along  these  lines.  If  we  consider  both  home  and  foreign  countries, 
we  may  collect  quite  a  library.  Yet  we  cannot  find  a  book  among 
them  all  which  attempts  to  teach  one  or  more  of  these  sciences  on 
the  basis  of  their  correlations  with  the  whole  subject.  Even  the 
Compendia  are  not  exceptions.  Usually  they  treat  somewhat  of 
economy  and  of  the  royal  revenues.  If  they  are  very  ample,  there 
will  be  a  few  sections  about  the  police,  but  in  the  fragmentary  fashion 

3'5 


3i6  THE  CAMERALISTS 

and  disorderly  arrangement  in  which  they  accidentally  occurred 
to  the  author.  I  am  by  no  means  inclined  to  blame  others,  and  I 
therefore  refrain  from  mentioning  names.  The  facts  however  are 
open  to  the  eyes  of  everyone.  Without  doubt  the  reason  of  it  is 
that,  through  some  ordering  of  destiny  which  I  do  not  understand, 
philosophical  minds  have  paid  no  attention  to  these  sciences  which 
so  intimately  concern  the  welfare  of  social  life.' 

We  call  the  sciences  dedicated  to  the  government  of  a  state  the 
economic  as  well  as  the  canieralistic  sciences,  or  the  economic  and 
cameralistic  sciences.'  Economics  or  Haushaltungskunst  has  for 
its  aim  to  teach  how  the  means  of  private  persons  {sic)  are  to  be 
preserved,  increased,  and  reasonably  applied.  What  economics 
attempts  to  do  in  connection  with  the  goods  of  private  j)ersons,  the 
governmental  sciences  aim  to  do  in  the  case  of  the  total  means  of 
the  state.  Hence  they  properly  bear  the  name,  the  economic  sciences.^ 
We  give  them  the  name  cameralistic  sciences,  however,  because  the 
high  collegia  which  the  sovereigns  have  established,  to  manage  the 
preservation,  expansion,  and  use  of  the  means  of  the  republic,  are 
usually  called  Cammern  or  Cammercollegia  (p.  32). 

Our  times  are  so  fortunate  that  almost  all  rulers  are  eager  to 
secure  for  their  states  a  flourishing  trade,  and  for  their  subjects  all 
kinds  of  subsistence  and  temporal  welfare.  I  do  not  venture  to  say 
that  this  providence  always  springs  from  genuine  sources,  that  is, 
from  love  for  the  subjects  and  from  paternal  impulse  to  make  them 
happy.  Self-love  is  here  and  there  the  chief  motive.  Yet  there  is 
rather  satisfactory  consciousness  on  the  part  of  princes  in  general 
that  they  cannot  be  great  and  powerful  if  they  have  a  land  that  is 
poor  and  resourceless.  All  courts  accordingly  use  language  con- 
sistent with  the  genuine  sources  of  motive  for  political  action.     It  is 

>  Zincke's  Cameralimssenschaft  appeared  the  same  year  with  Justi's 
first  edition.  I  fear  he  was  a  cad  to  publish  such  a  reflection  three  years 
later. 

'  In  Adam  Smith  and  Modern  Sociology,  pp.  189  and  210,  I  have 
called  attention  to  the  strange  turn  of  a£fairs  which  led  von  Mohl  to 
declare  that  political  science  had  nothing  to  do  with  political  economy. 
This  antithesis  must  be  looked  into  later. 

3  The  unsteadiness  of  the  conception  in  Justi's  mind  is  evident. 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  317 

our  business  to  set  in  order  the  principles  of  these  governmental 
sciences,  which  the  nature  of  things,  truth,  and  sound  reason  demand. 
These  principles  must  be  derived  from  the  ultimate  purpose  of  the 
state.  What  then  is  a  state,  and  in  what  does  its  ultimate  purpose 
consist?  (p.  33). 

It  is  evident  that  Justi  is  to  a  certain  extent  aware  that  he 
is  proposing  ideal  principles  rather  than  those  which  are 
actually  accepted  by  the  ruling  classes.  It  is  not  so  plain  that 
he  saw  the  inherent  antagonism  between  contemporary  political 
policies  and  abstract  principles.  He  was  apparently  concerned 
with  generalizations  primarily  as  a  rational  basis  for  existing 
practice,  and  only  secondarily,  if  at  all,  as  a  leverage  for  change 
of  practice.  Yet  the  moment  one  begins  to  formulate  human 
society,  in  general,  or  a  state,  in  particular,  in  accordance  with 
rational  categories  of  whatever  sort,  one  inevitably  initiates  a 
reconstructive  impulse.  The  problems  are  thereby  presented: 
Why  does  not  the  actuality  conform  to  the  theory  ?  and.  What 
is  to  be  done,  either  to  the  actuality  or  to  the  theory,  in  view 
of  the  discrepancy  ? 

Justi  answers  his  own  question  in  this  way  (p.  33) : 

It  is  usually  asserted  that  republics  have  been  derived  from  fear 
of  incursions.  It  is  more  probable  that  they  grew  out  of  the  govern- 
ing skill  of  families;  that  is,  the  patriarch  must  necessarily  have  had 
a  certain  prestige  and  power  over  his  children  and  servants,  which 
descended  at  his  death  to  his  eldest  son,  until  in  the  course  of  time 
it  amounted  to  a  real  rulership.  We  have  many  evidences  that  this 
was  the  fact,  but  of  course  they  do  not  account  for  great  empires, 
which  have  always  been  formed  by  force  of  arms. 

With  no  further  fact  or  theory  or  criticism  as  a  basis,  Justi 
proceeds  to  the  following  definition  (p.  34): 

A  republic  or  state  is  a  unification  of  a  multitude  of  people  under 
a  supreme  power,  for  the  ultimate  purpose  of  their  happiness;  or 
we  may  say,  a  republic  consists  of  a  multitude  of  people  who  are 
combined  with  each  other  by  means  of  a  general  interdependence 


3i8  THE  CAMERALISTS 

and  certain  fixed  institutions,  in  order,  with  their  united  energies, 
and  under  a  superimposed  supreme  power,  to  promote  their  common 
happiness.  Republics  are  accordingly  distinguished  from  GeseU- 
schaften  or  SocieUUen,  which,  to  be  sure,  have  a  certain  best,  and 
sometimes  happiness  in  general,  as  their  aim,  but  have  never  sub- 
ordinated themselves  to  a  supreme  power.  The  supreme  power  in 
the  state  accordingly  originates  without  doubt  from  the  people; 
a  principle  which  today  is  as  universally  recognized  as  true  as  it  was 
formerly  regarded  as  dangerous  by  little  minds. 

Hamlet's  reflection,  "What  a  piece  of  work  is  man!" 
might  be  parodied  from  the  opposite  point  of  view,  with  such 
generalizations  as  the  foregoing  as  the  point  of  departure, 
With  what  Pickwickian  states  of  mind  do  men  fool  themselves ! 
In  a  political  society  in  which  government  was  primarily  of, 
for,  and  by  the  sovereign,  a  theorist  could  still  suppose  he  was 
dealing  with  realities  in  basing  a  technological  system  on  the 
presumption  that  the  power  of  the  sovereign  is  derived  from 
the  people.  Perhaps  the  anomaly  is  most  striking  when 
inverted.  Sovereigns  could  persist  in  acting  as  though  they 
had  absolute  rights  as  sovereigns,  for  generations  after  men 
of  thought  had  discovered  that  the  powers  of  sovereigns  come 
from  the  people.  The  wonder  is  not  so  great  as  it  seems, 
because  the  anomaly  does  not  by  any  means  last  so  long  after 
the  discovery  as  appearances  seem  to  indicate.  It  is  alto- 
gether improbable,  for  instance,  that  to  Justi  the  formula, 
"The  power  of  sovereigns  is  derived  from  the  people,"  meant 
what  it  means  to  us.  Nor  did  it  have  precisely  the  psychologi- 
cal sense  in  which  it  is  a  truism.  It  had  rather  a  vague,  dreamy, 
mixed  sense,  made  up  in  part  of  purely  idealized  notions  of 
the  relation,  partly  of  the  historical  hypothesis  above  expressed. 
The  thought-medium  in  which  this  idea  was  carried,  however, 
was  a  strong  tincture  of  superstition  about  some  sort  of  fore- 
ordained fitness  of  certain  hereditary  lines  to  be  the  repositories 
of  these  powers  over  their  fellow-men;    and  accordingly  it 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  319 

carried  an  energetic  presumption  that  the  well-being  of  these 
multitudes  was  to  be  thought  of  in  terms  of  the  pleasure  of  the 
sovereign,  rather  than  of  the  wants  of  the  subjects. 

Yet  Justi  seems  to  be  very  much  in  advance  of  his  time 
when  he  continues  (p.  35) : 

The  ultimate  aim  of  each  and  every  republic  is  therefore  unques- 
tionably the  common  happiness It  is  unnecessary  to  enlarge 

upon  the  proposition,  therefore,  that  the  subjects  do  not  exist  for  the 
sake  of  the  ruler. 

But  it  was  precisely  this  principle  which  was  to  be  the  bone 
of  contention  between  sovereigns  and  subjects  for  the  next 
hundred  years.  The  system  which  Justi  was  trying  to  inter- 
pret, and  for  which  he  wanted  to  train  recruits,  was  historically 
an  assertion  of  the  contrary  principle. 

As  previously  in  the  Grundriss,^  Justi  formulates  as  "the 
first  and  universal  principle  of  all  economic  and  cameralistic 
sciences"  the  following  proposition  (p.  35): 

All  the  administrative  transactions  of  a  state  must  ]ye  so  ordered 
that  by  means  of  them  the  happiness  of  the  same  (i.  e.,  of  the  state) 
shall  be  promoted.' 

To  what  extent  we  have  here  a  clue  to  the  conflict  of  ideas 
in  Justi's  mind,  and  in  the  civilization  of  the  time,  it  would  be 
unsafe  to  infer  with  much  positiveness.  The  confusion  is 
notorious,  both  in  abstract  thinking  and  in  the  current  social 
practice.  Neither  the  psychology  nor  the  logic  nor  the  sociol- 
ogy of  it  is  our  immediate  concern,  beyond  mere  observation 
of  the  fact.  We  are  at  present  interested  in  tracing  the  develop- 
ment of  scientific  consciousness  out  of  this  situation.  Merely 
as  a  symptom  of  the  situation,  as  a  sign  of  the  lack  of  precision 
and  consistency  of  view,  we  may  note  that  in  the  previous 
paragraph  Justi  had  been  talking  about  the  well-being  of 
subjects,  as  the  end  for  rulers  to  subserve,  or  "the  common 

I  Above,  p.  310.  »  Vide  below,  p.  327. 


320  THE  CAMERALISTS 

happiness."  In  the  formula  which  he  now  constructs  to 
enSbody  that  idea,  the  center  of  attention  is  the  happiness  of  the 
state.  No  long  argument  is  necessary  to  show  that  there  was 
room  for  endless  incongruity  and  inconsistency  in  theory  and 
practice  so  long  as  such  variable  common  denominators  were 
used  as  "subjects,"  "the  common  happiness,"  and  "the 
happiness  of  the  state." 

In  other  words,  there  was  not  yet  a  precise  and  consistent 
analysis  of  civic  relations.  Conceptions  of  civic  relations 
were  fluid  and  shifting.  As  Hegel  might  have  put  it:  Expe- 
rience was  only  partially  self-conscious.  Theory  was  accord- 
ingly in  many  ways  in  contradiction  with  itself  and  with 
practice.  Both  theory  and  practice  were  unsystematically 
feeling  their  way  toward  precision  and  consistency.  Justi 
bravely  declares  that  the  sequel  will  prove  the  theorem  just 
quoted  to  have  the  character  of  a  universal  principle,  and  to 
be  the  source  from  which  all  doctrines  of  the  state  and  of 
government  may  be  coherently  derived  (p.  36). 

Then  Justi  classifies  all  "republics  or  forms  of  govern- 
ment" (sic)  into  the  three  types: 

(i)  The  monarchy  or  autocracy,  in  which  the  power  resides  in 
one  alone;  (2)  the  aristocracy,  or  the  government  of  the  better  class 
[Vornekm];  (3)  the  democracy,  or  the  rule  of  the  common  people. 
Then  there  are  mixed  forms. 

This  whole  type  of  analysis,  not  yet  by  any  means  out- 
grown, makes  form  of  political  structure  the  decisive  matter, 
and  does  not  press  back  to  the  psychological  or  even  the  socio- 
logical meaning  of  the  form.  Commenting  on  the  analysis, 
Justi  adds: 

It  is  easy  to  prove  that  the  monarchical  form  of  government  is 
far  preferable  to  all  others,  in  consideration  of  the  rapidity  with 
which  it  can  grasp  the  means  of  happiness  of  a  state,  and  becauM 
many  domestic  disturbances  and  discords  are  thus  prevented.    It 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  321 

is  also  certain  that  a  single  good  monarch  can  do  more  good  than 
free  republics  could  bring  to  pass  in  centuries  (p.  38).* 

Since  the  monarchical  form  of  government  is  taken  for  granted 
in  this  book,  it  is  necessary  to  consider  the  various  constructions 
of  the  monarchical  form:  viz.,  (i)  with  reference  to  succession  of 
rulers;  (2)  with  reference  to  unlimited  or  limited  power;  (3)  with 
reference  to  the  connection  of  realms  and  territories  which  belong 
to  a  monarchy  (pp.  39-43). 

The  analysis  under  these  heads  is  of  the  most  elementary 
and  obvious  sort,  and  dynastic  convenience  is  throughout  the 
principal  test  of  value.  Thus  Justi  sa3rs  that  there  are  ample 
grounds  for  the  conclusion  that  women  are  not  fit  to  govern  a 
state;  yet  he  adds  that  the  same  reasons  would  exclude  an 
incompetent  or  ignorant  man  from  the  succession.  Without 
saying  it  directly,  he  implies  that  the  fixed  succession  in  the 
male  line  is  notwithstanding  a  lesser  evil  than  uncertainty 
about  the  succession.  In  a  note  he  makes  a  remark  which 
throws  light  on  the  preconceptions  which  lead  to  this  judg- 
ment: 

A  realm  is  in  its  essence  nothing  but  an  estate  [Landgui\,  which 
might  fall  into  the  hands  of  an  alien  heir  (p.  39). 

The  discussion  is  so  general  in  its  character  that  it  is  a 
famous  object-lesson  in  the  futility  of  deciding  upon  social 
arrangements  by  means  of  academic  generalizations.  Whether 
a  monarchy,  limited  or  unlimited,  an  aristocracy,  or  a  democ- 
racy is  the  best  government,  proves  to  be  a  question  quite 
co-ordinate  with  the  problem  whether  a  saw  or  a  hat  or  a  loaf 
oif  bread  is  the  best  piece  of  property.  There  is  no  universal 
"best"  in  either  case.  The  historical  judgment  in  both  cases, 
that  is,  the  actual  working  judgment,  the  judgment  that  holds, 
is  the  judgment  not  of  types  but  of  workings.  The  academic 
method  thus  illustrated  by  Justi  must  always  sooner  or  later 

>  As  we  have  pointed  out  before,  this  is  today  one  of  the  most  con- 
fident presumptions  of  industrial  monarchy. 


322  THE  CAMERALISTS 

give  way  to  the  pragmatic  method  best  illustrated  on  a  large 
scale  by  British  history. 

At  the  same  time  it  mufit  be  admitted  that  there  was  much 
more  pragmatism  in  fact  than  in  form  in  Justi's  theories;  and 
this  is  almost  universally  the  case  with  social  philosophers. 
That  is,  he  dealt  with  universal  propositions,  but  they  were 
univcrsals  of  which  particular  cases  were  given  in  the  current 
problems  of  German  states,  and  more  than  he  was  aware  he 
was  really  asking:  "Which  of  the  possible  alternatives  will 
work  best  in  this  situation  ?"  Questions  of  checks  upon  the 
ruler,  of  succession  to  the  throne,  of  relations  between  terri- 
tories politically  connected  only  through  a  common  ruler, 
were  everyday  affairs.  The  judgments  passed  upon  them, 
both  by  practical  and  theoretical  reasoners,  were  in  this  form: 
So  and  so  works  best  with  us  just  now:  ergo^  so  and  so  is  a 
universal  principle.  This  type  of  fallacy  is  long-lived.  In 
slightly  less  naive  shape  it  underlies  the  Smithian  political 
economy.  Adam  Smith  knew,  yet  he  did  not  know,  that  the 
capitalistic  order  of  society  in  which  he  lived  was  merely  a  stage 
in  historical  evolution  in  the  same  series  with  community 
ownership,  and  with  feudalism.  He  believed,  however,  that 
the  social  division,  landlord,  capitalist,  and  proletarian,  worked 
well.  Hence  he  canceled  the  historical  factor  and  concluded 
that  the  stratification,  landlord,  capitalist,  and  proletarian,  is 
eternal;  and  he  proceeded  to  draw  all  further  conclusions 
with  this  premise  reckoned  as  a  finality.  The  judgments  which 
Justi  expresses  are  defective  in  a  much  more  elementary  way, 
because  they  are  based  on  a  presupposition  of  a  much  more 
precarious  type.  The  corollaries  which  he  immediately  draws 
are  as  follows: 

(i)  The  fixed  form  of  succession  is  necessary  to  the  happiness 
of  a  state,  because  otherwise  the  state  can  expect  nothing  but  unrest, 
wars,  and  disruption;  (2)  the  territorial  possessions,  and  the  freedom 
of  those  classes  that  are  not  harmful  to  the  welfare  of  the  state  must 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  323 

be  preserved;  (3)  no  new  liberties  and  privileges  must  be  conceded 
which  interfere  with  facile  control  of  the  means  of  happiness  of  a 
state  (pp.  43,  44);  (4)  various  realms  and  lands  belonging  to  a 
monarch  must  be  combined  in  a  union  and  a  general  organization, 
because  separation  hinders  the  use  of  the  full  powers  of  the  state, 
prevents  complete  employment  of  means  of  revenue,  especially  in 
commerce,  and  leads  to  antipathy  and  jealousy  between  the  different 
territories. 

In  qualifying  this  conclusion  Justi  betrays  the  opportun- 
ism that  is  really  decisive  in  all  his  judgments  (p.  46). 

Further  light  falls  on  the  standpoint  of  the  whole  system 
in  the  elaboration  of  these  clauses.  Thus  Justi  observes  that 
some  states  seem  to  assume  as  a  principle  the  opposite  of 
(2),  i.  e.,  liberties  are  suppressed  as  much  as  possible.  There- 
upon he  remarks  that  "there  are  weighty  considerations  making 
for  the  conclusion  that  a  monarch  does  no  wrong  in  adopting 
this  policy:  for  usually  such  liberties  are  no  good  to  the  state, 
but  are  merely  for  the  benefit  of  individuals."  The  two 
terms,  "state"  and  "individual,"  here  brought  into  compar- 
ison, were  relatively  unanalyzed  concepts;  and  judgments 
between  them  were  necessarily  rough.  The  leaning  in  favor 
of  the  state  as  contrasted  with  private  persons  is,  however, 
plain  and  characteristic.  When  Justi  puts  into  German 
the  familiar  Roman  epigram  in  the  form:  "The  happiness 
of  the  state  is  its  highest  law,"  we  must  understand  him  to 
mean  not  what  a  Roman  tribune  would  mean,  nor  what  an 
American  democrat  would  mean.  He  meant:  "The  success- 
ful carrying-out  of  the  policy  which  the  ruling  power  in  the 
typical  German  state  sets  up  as  its  aim  is  the  paramount 
consideration."  It  is  impossible  to  determine  precisely  how 
much  his  frequent  partial  formulations  of  more  popular  stand- 
ards should  modify  this  proposition.* 

The  nature  of  the  presuppositions  on  which  Justi's  system 

»  Vide  below,  p.  327. 


324  THE  CAMERALISTS 

rests  appears  further  in  his  analysis  of  the  monarchical  factor 
in  the  state.    Thus  he  begins  with  the  definition  (p.  47): 

A  monarch  or  ruler  [Regent]  is  the  supreme  head  of  the  state, 
or  of  the  republic,  who  possesses  the  highest  power  in  order  that 
by  means  of  it  he  may  take  care  of  all  the  affairs  of  the  community 
and  may  apply  efficient  means  for  promoting  the  common  happi- 
ness. 

These  words  could  of  course  be  fitted  out  with  an  utterly 
democratic  meaning.  Their  connotations  at  the  time  were 
at  best  patriarchal,  and  as  a  rule  the  patriarchalism  was  of  a 
sort  which  inverted  the  personal  relations  actually  concerned. 
That  is,  state  policy  was  incarnated  in  the  ruler,  whose  success 
was  identified  with  "the  happiness  of  the  state;"  while  the 
individuals  subject  to  the  ruler  were  in  the  last  analysis  not 
regarded  as  having  any  well-being  which  deserved  to  weigh 
against  "the  happiness  of  the  state"  so  conceived.  This 
appears  always  only  in  part,  in  formulas  of  the  royal  character 
or  powers.  These  theorems  are  never  perfectly  clear  either 
way.  They  contain  elements  of  contradictory  views.  They 
can  be  interpreted  correctly,  therefore,  not  by  mere  linguistic 
rules,  but  by  the  light  of  the  conduct  in  which  they  were 
applied.  Such  partially  ambiguous  propositions  follow, 
e.g.: 

The  chief  duty  of  the  monarch  consists  therefore  in  guardian- 
ship of  the  happiness  of  the  subjects. 

But  in  the  next  sentence  the  other  conception  reappears, 
viz.: 

We  should  form  a  very  erroneous  idea  of  the  monarch  if  we 
thought  of  him  as  an  administrator  or  superintendent  of  the  supreme 
power  and  of  the  affairs  of  the  community.  In  this  way  we  should 
make  of  the  monarch  merely  the  servant  of  the  state,  and  place  the 
republic  over  him,  so  that  he  could  not  be  distinguished  from  a 
StaatkalUr.  This  is  the  false  notion  held  by  the  Monarchomachif 
from  which  so  many  harmful  and  dangerous  conclusions  follow. 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  325 

In  the  note  to  this  paragraph,  the  idea  is  made  still  plainer, 
viz.: 

The  enemies  of  the  supreme  power,  and  especially  of  absolutism, 
whom  we  are  accustomed  to  call  the  Monarchomachi,  adopt  as  their 
chief  principle  the  theorem  that  the  whole  people  is  above  the  ruler, 
and  hence  may  either  call  him  to  account  for  acts  prejudicial  to  the 
welfare  of  the  community,  or  may  resist  him.  From  such  damnable 
principles  came  the  unhappy  tragedy  of  the  unfortunate  Charles  I 
of  England,  and  from  the  same  cause  Henry  III  came  to  his  death 
in  France.  Nothing  is  more  detestable  than  these  ideas  which  arc 
evidently  contrary  to  the  nature  of  a  republic  and  open  the  doors  to 
all  sorts  of  uproar  and  disorder  (p.  47). 

Here  then  we  are  dealing  with  the  familiar  fallacy  of  passing 
judgments  first  on  fragments  of  situations,  and  then  promoting 
those  judgments  to  the  rank  of  principles  with  universal 
validity.  With  such  beginnings,  modem  social  science  is  still 
not  too  far  along  in  the  juvenile  grades  of  its  education. 

The  supreme  power  [die  hochste  Gewalt]  is  next  defined  as 
consisting  "in  the  use  of  the  total  means  and  powers  of  the 
state  in  order  thereby  to  attain  the  ultimate  end  of  the  same, 
viz.,  its  common  happiness"  (p.  48).' 

Again  we  must  not  take  these  eighteenth-century  words  as 
indicating  twentieth-century  ideas.  Every  shade  of  meaning 
has  to  be  challenged,  to  be  sure  that  the  real  thought  is  de- 
tected. The  clue  to  the  diflference  between  the  earlier  and  the 
later  conceptions  is  in  the  antithesis  between  the  conception  of 
the  monarch  and  the  state,  as  incarnations  of  the  community 
in  a  sense'  which  left  the  people  in  a  status  of  tributary  exter- 
nality, and  on  the  other  hand,  the  conception  of  ruler  or  chief 
magistrate  as  merely  the  representative  and  the  agent  of  the 
state,  which  is  simply  a  name  for  the  people  in  their  political 
relations.  If  this  latter  idea  were  forced  into  Justi's  further 
explanations,  they  would  in  a  general  way  command  present 

«  Vide  pp.  327,  and  372,  373. 


326  THE  CAMERALISTS 

assent.  But  the  other  idea  has  to  be  understood  in  connection 
with  the  words,  and  they  then  describe  what  actually  was  in 
German  states  at  the  time,  but  has  to  a  considerable  extent 
been  revolutionized  out  of  them  meanwhile.  Thus  Justi  says 
(p.  48): 

We  should  limit  the  supreme  power  much  too  narrowly  if  we 
should  make  it  consist  merely  in  laws,  ordinances,  penalties,  etc. 
To  the  means  and  powers  of  the  state  belong  not  only  all  sorts  of 
goods,  both  fixed  and  movable,  within  the  boundaries  of  the  country, 
but  also  all  the  talents  and  abilities  of  the  persons  who  reside  in  the 
country.  The  reasonable  use  of  all  these  things,  then,  and  the 
prerogative  of  such  use,  is  therefore  the  supreme  power. 

The  judgment  passed  above  on  Justi's  generalization  of 
particular  utilities  into  universal  principles,  in  the  case  of  the 
monarch,  would  have  to  be  paralleled  if  we  went  into  particulars 
about  his  opinion  of  the  relations  between  the  lawgiving,  the 
judicial,  and  the  executive  departments  of  government  (pp. 

49-51)- 

Following  these  most  general  observations  about  the 
organization  of  states,  Justi  returns  to  the  fundamental  propo- 
sition which  dictates  the  divi»ons  of  his  book,  viz. : 

The  business  of  a  ruler  falls  into  two  great  divisions,  to  wit: 
(i)  the  preservation  and  expansion  of  the  means  of  the  state;  (2) 
the  wise  application  of  these  means,  both  in  use  and  in  thrift.* 
Hence  all  the  sciences  concerned  with  the  government  of  a  state 
fall  into  a  twofold  division.  The  first  contains  statecraft,  Policey, 
and  commercial  science,  along  with  economy  (Oeconomie),  all  of  which 
aim  either  to  preserve  or  to  increase  the  means  of  the  state.  The 
second  comprises  the  cameral  sciences  proper,  which  teach  how  to 
use  these  means  wisely  and  in  promotion  of  the  happiness  of  the 
state. 

Since  the  paramount  aim  of  the  state  is  to  preserve  and  extend 

«  I  translate  the  phrase  " gebrauchet  und  damil  gewirthsckaftet"  in 
this  clumsy  way,  to  avoid  premature  use  of  the  technical  concepts  "con- 
sumption" and  "production." 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  327 

its  means  [Vermdgen],  this  purpose  must  be  regarded  as  the  chief 
responsibility  of  rulers,  and  Justi  accordingly  deduces  the  following 
theorems  (p.  53) : 

1.  The  monarch  must  make  use  of  means  and  measures  through 
which  the  resources  of  the  state  may  be  preserved  and  expanded, 
and  his  subjects  may  be  made  happy. 

2.  The  subjects  must  facilitate  these  measures  by  their  obedi- 
ence and  diligence  [Fleiss]. 

From  these  principles  another  follows,  viz. : 

3.  The  welfare  of  the  ruler  and  the  happiness  of  the  subjects 
can  never  be  separated,  and  the  one  without  the  other  can  never 
permanently  exist. 

There  is  more  pathos  and  naivit^  than  conscious  hypoc- 
risy in  this  third  proposition.  It  is  true  in  the  same  sense  in 
which  the  familiar  classical  economic  dogma  about  the  unity 
of  interest  between  employer  and  employee  is  true;  and  it  is 
false  in  the  same  way  that  this  economic  dogma  was  false. 
If  there  were  some  infallible  arbiter  of  the  interests  concerned 
in  either  case,  the  formula  might  be  so  construed  as  to  express 
the  truth.  The  well-being  of  subjects  is  by  no  means  neces- 
sarily harmonious  with  the  well-being  of  rulers,  when  the 
rulers  have  power  to  determine  both;  any  more  than  the 
interests  of  employers  and  of  employees  are  necessarily  one, 
when  the  employers  have  the  power  to  pronounce  upon  both. 

Justi's  note  on  Machiavelli  at  this  point  is  instructive 
(p.  54).  He  cannot  understand  how  his  Italian  predecessor 
can  possibly  have  meant  some  of  his  doctrines  seriously;  and 
therefore  adopts  the  theory  that  The  Prince  was  a  heavily 
veiled  satire.  The  more  probable  alternative  from  our  present 
point  of  view  is  explanation  of  Machiavelli  and  Justi  on 
precisely  the  same  grounds.  Each  was  a  product  of  his 
environment,  with  a  sufficient  force  of  variation  to  betray 
innovating  impulses  that  looked  toward  a  modified  environ- 
ment. Contradiction  and  inconsistency  were  in  both  cases 
an  inevitable  part  of  the  situation. 


328  THE  CAMERALISTS 

That  Justi  mixed  much  sentiment  and  idealism  with  his 
programme  of  objective  analysis,  may  be  illustrated  by  citation 
of  the  next  paragraph  (p.  55)  viz.: 

From  the  combined  welfare  of  the  ruler  and  the  subjects  alone 
springs  the  real  strength  of  a  state.  This  strength  consists  prin- 
cipally of  the  reciprocal  trust  and  love  which  the  wise  ruler  and  the 
fortunate  subjects  of  a  considerable  state  have  for  each  other,  while 
they  endeavor  with  united  energies  to  preserve  and  extend  the 
resources  of  the  state.  For  neither  the  well-filled  treasury  and  the 
formidable  army  of  the  ruler,  nor  a  land  living  in  riches  and  abun- 
dance makes  this  strength.  Such  a  condition,  however  happy  it 
appears  to  be,  is  by  no  means  sufficient  against  all  accidents.  History 
is  not  empty  of  examples  of  the  most  powerful  and  flourishing 
realms  which  unexpectedly  came  to  destruction.  A  monarch  has 
accordingly  met  with  a  great  loss  if  he  no  longer  enjoys  the  love  and 
confidence  of  his  subjects. 

It  is  impracticable  to  give  an  adequate  account  of  Justi's 
work  without  succumbing  to  his  own  tediously  repetitious 
style  of  exposition.  We  have  already  had  occasion  to  notice 
two  or  three  variations  of  his  general  scheme.  We  come  now 
to  still  another  explanation  which  we  may  reproduce  in  brief. 
Of  the  sciences  to  be  treated  in  the  first  part  of  the  Staais- 
wirthschaft,  Justi  says  (pp.  60-62): 

The  chief  purpose  of  Staatskunst  is  to  assure  complete  security 
for  the  community,  both  against  external  and  internal  dangers. 
The  immediate  reason  for  this  purpose  is  that  these  dangers  threaten 
the  common  welfare,  and  weaken  the  resources  and  powers  of  the 
state.  Statecraft  thus  obviously  seems  to  preserve  the  resources 
of  the  state. 

Policeymssenschaft  is  concerned  chiefly  with  the  conduct  [Lebens- 
wandd\  and  sustenance  [Nahrung]  of  the  subjects,  and  its  great 
purpose  is  to  put  both  in  such  equilibrium  and  correlation  that  the 
subjects  of  the  republic  will  be  useful,  and  in  a  position  easily  to 
support  themselves. 

The  name  "commercial  science"  is  applied  to  two  distinct 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  329 

sciences.  The  one  teaches  the  ways  and  means  of  conducting 
commerce,  and  the  composition  of  goods  with  which  commerce  is 
carried  on.  The  other  treats  of  the  measures  by  means  of  which 
commercial  enterprises  may  be  established  and  made  to  flourish, 
so  that  as  a  result  the  sustenance  of  subjects  may  be  more  ample 
and  the  resources  of  the  country  may  be  increased.  The  latter 
presupposes  knowledge  of  the  former,  so  that  it  is  not  dependent 
merely  on  the  reports  of  traders  themselves,  and  it  (the  latter)  is 
peculiarly  appropriate  for  those  persons  who  are  charged  with  the 
government  of  the  state.  Accordingly  it  may  be  called,  in  distinc- 
tion from  the  first,  civic-conunercial-science  [Staatscotnmercien- 
wissenschaft].  Fundamentally  it  is  a  subordinate  science  of  Policey, 
and  it  is  a  subject  which  we  shall  presently  discuss.  It  is  evident 
that  this  science,  too,  ends  with  extending  the  resources  of  the  state. 

Management  [Haushaltungskunst]  is  particularly  devoted  to 
showing  how  the  resources  of  private  persons  may  be  preserved, 
increased,  and  well  used:  and  since  rural  thrift  is  of  great  im- 
portance to  the  state,  this  branch  of  science,  after  referring  to  all 
classes  and  vocations,  gives  special  attention  to  the  ways  and  means 
of  cultivation.  The  more  thrifty  the  private  persons,  the  greater  and 
securer  the  resources  of  the  state.  Again  there  can  be  no  doubt  that 
the  science  of  management  is  tributary  to  the  preservation  and 
extension  of  the  resources  of  the  state. 

Since  the  co-operation  of  ruler  and  subjects  is  necessary  for  these 
ends,  the  subject-matter  of  these  sciences  involves  two  chief  con- 
siderations, viz.: 

1.  What  means  and  measures  has  the  ruler  to  adopt,  in  order 
to  preserve  and  increase  the  resources  of  the  state,  and  thus  to 
promote  the  happiness  of  his  subjects  ? 

2.  What  duties  have  the  subjects  in  order  to  lighten  the  rcsiwn- 
sibilities  of  the  ruler  ? 

The  treatment  is  divided  into  two  books  in  accordance  with 
this  latter  subdivision. 

As  a  special  introduction  to  the  former  of  these  subjects, 
civics,  or  statecraft,  on  the  side  of  the  ruler,  Justi  attempts 
to  define  the  concept  "happiness"  [GlUckseligkeit],  which  is 


33°  THE  CAMERALISTS 

the  goal  of  statecraft  (pp.  65  ff.).  He  distinguishes  it  in  the 
first  place  from  the  philosophical  concept,  "happiness,"  which 
he  describes  as  "perfection  of  our  moral  condition,  and  the 
consequent  felicity  of  the  soul."  On  the  other  hand,  the 
happiness  here  in  question  is  either  the  perfection  of  our  external 
condition,  or  some  specially  advantageous  occurrence  which 
could  not  properly  have  been  expected  from  our  situation. 
More  definitely  expressed,  Justi  means  by  the  happiness  of 
subjects  in  the  present  connection: 

such  good  arrangement  and  structure  of  a  state  that  everyone  may 
enjoy  a  reasonable  freedom,  and  by  his  diligence  may  be  able  to 
attain  those  moral  and  temporal  goods  which  the  demands  of  his 
social  station  make  necessary  for  satisfactory  living. 

In  spite  of  himself  Justi  includes  much  more  than  material 
goods  in  this  concept,  yet  the  moral  elements  which  he  inserts 
in  the  specifications  have  to  be  scrutinized  with  great  care  to 
distinguish  them  from  the  concepts  which  the  same  terms 
now  suggest  to  us.  For  instance,  he  explains  that  "the 
freedom  of  the  subjects  is  indispensably  necessary  to  their 
happiness,"  yet  the  whole  treatise  is  in  principle  and  in  detail 
a  definition  of  relations  between  ruler  and  subject  to  which 
our  generation  would  deny  the  predicate  "freedom."  We 
must  emphasize  our  previous  observation  that  the  essence  of 
the  situation  of  which  Justi  was  a  symptom  must  be  formulated 
as  an  effort  to  express,  in  theory  and  in  practice,  the  purposes 
involved  in  the  situation  in  terms  of  the  paramount  governing 
factor  of  the  situation.  This  is  a  social  solecism.  Social 
logic  is  a  progressive  demonstration  of  the  fallacy.  The 
interaction  of  the  interests  represented  by  these  two  terms, 
ruler  and  subject,  or  more  generally,  social  control  and  individ- 
ual initiative,  is  the  process  actually  going  on,  so  far  as  these 
two  terms  at  any  moment  are  active  factors  of  the  process. 
Justi  accordingly  had  in  mind  a  relatively  local,  temporary, 
provisional  phase  of  the  social  process,  and  he  virtually  at- 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  331 

tempted  to  generalize  this  transient  situation  as  a  universal 
condition,  and  to  lay  down  the  laws  of  its  equilibrium  as 
laws  of  universal  equilibrium.  When  we  have  pointed  this 
out,  we  have  really  closed  the  rational  verdict  upon  the  system, 
and  upon  all  others  of  which  it  is  a  type.  But  we  are  at  work 
upon  something  more  than  the  mere  appraisal  of  a  piece  of 
archaic  philosophy  and  technology.  Our  main  interest  in  it 
is  as  it  functions  as  a  term  in  the  evolution  of  social  science 
in  general.  With  this  purpose  in  view,  we  must  continue  the 
analysis.  We  must  try  to  discover  how  the  fallacies  of  attrib- 
uting a  static  character  to  the  evolving,  and  a  universal 
validity  to  the  particular,  progressively  discredited  partial 
science  and  forced  more  valid  representation  of  reality. 

Justi  specifies  "freedom,  assured  property,  and  flourishing 
industry,"  as  the  three  chief  factors  on  which  the  happiness 
of  the  state  and  of  the  subjects  depends.'  These  specifica- 
tions completely  omit  the  factor  which  modem  democracies 
have  placed  at  the  head  of  the  list,  viz.,  government  of,  for, 
and  by  the  people.  The  cameralistic  conception  of  the  state 
was  that  of  a  population  free  to  conduct  their  private  affairs 
for  themselves,  but  not  presuming  to  have  thoughts  or  ac- 
tions about  public  affairs  except  as  they  were  dictated  by  the 
ruler.  This  arbitrary  distinction  between  private  and  public 
interests  could  not  withstand  the  wear  and  tear  of  the  social 
process;  but  before  the  artificiality  of  the  distinction  was 
discovered  civic  life  had  to  struggle  on  a  long  time  under  the 
embarrass  ment  of  the  provisional  absolutistic  theory  and 
practice. 

Entering  upon  discussion  of  the  security  of  the  state,  Justi 
urges  (p.  70)  that: 

more  must  be  understood  under  this  head  than  the  condition  of  the 
subjects  in  which,  freed  from  all  violence  and  fear,  they  may  peace- 

»  In  Grundriss  einer  guten  Regierung,  p.  65,  Justi  makes  the  con- 
stituents of  happiness,  "freedom,  internal  strength,  and  security." 


33*  THE  CAMERALISTS 

fully  enjoy  their  goods  and  pursue  their  vocations.  The  state 
itself  must  be  in  such  a  condition  that,  without  fear  of  a  stronger 
power,  it  may  make  use  of  all  means  and  measures  which  it  finds 
necessary  for  its  prosperity  and  for  the  happiness  of  the  subjects. 
The  fact  that  such  danger  to  the  state  itself  may  come  from  either 
external  or  internal  assault,  makes  it  necessary  to  develop  the  theory 
of  state  action  with  reference  to  each  type  of  contingency.  This 
gives  the  classification  of  the  material  of  this  division  into  two 
sections. 

We  come  then  to  the  specific  teachings  of  the  book.  Since 
Justi  is  much  more  significant  as  an  epitomizer  of  the  whole 
cameralistic  movement  than  as  an  original  contributor  to  the 
theory,  it  is  necessary  for  our  purpose  to  present  the  most 
complete  survey  possible  of  his  principal  doctrines.  We  have 
therefore  compressed  the  most  important  sections  in  the  volume 
into  a  series  of  brief  propositions,  viz.: 

1.  A  republic  enjoys  external  security  when  it  is  fortified  against 
conquest  and  even  against  the  excessive  power  of  a  neighboring 
state  (p.  72). 

2.  Interest  is  the  moving  spring  of  all  actions  of  states,  and  when 
two  peoples  insist  on  their  irreconcilable  interests  war  is  the  con- 
sequence (p.  72). 

3.  Hence  two  things  are  necessary:  first,  discreet  conduct  to- 
ward other  free  powers;  and,  second,  a  sufficient  army  (p.  73). 

4.  Discreet  conduct  toward  other  states  involves:  first,  knowl- 
edge of  all  other  European  states;  second,  adequate  knowledge  of 
the  home  state,  its  physical  and  personal  make-up  Cp-  74)- 

5.  A  state  must  perfectly  understand  the  nature  of  its  relations 
to  other  states,  the  previous  history  of  those  relations,  etc.  (p.  76). 

6.  The  so-called  "balance  of  power"  in  Europe  is  an  academic 
invention.  If  there  were  such  a  system  no  one  would  have  less 
cause  to  conform  to  it  than  the  house  of  Austria  (p.  77). 

7.  A  state  must  ()bser\e  natural  law,  the  law  of  nations,  and  the 
social  duties  toward  other  states  (p.  78).' 

'  A  nolo  qualifies  ihe  propjosition  by  asserting  that  this  must  never  go 
80  far  as  the  making  of  apologies  by  one  state  to  another. 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  333 

8.  A  state  must  seek  to  discover  the  movements  and  intentions 
of  other  states  (p.  79). 

9.  For  the  foregoing  purpose  the  most  able  and  discreet  men 
must  be  selected  as  ambassadors  (p.  80). 

10.  But  no  pains  must  be  spared  to  get  the  necessary  imforma- 
tion  by  secret  means  (p.  81). 

11.  No  state  should  invent  schemes  for  the  disadvantage  of 
others  which  would  be  disgraceful  if  discovered  (p.  81). 

12.  When  a  state  discovers  such  secret  machinations,  it  often 
performs  a  good  service  by  informing  the  court  of  the  country  in 
whose  interest  the  plans  are  made,  that  the  plot  is  known.  This 
usually  leads  to  abandonment  of  the  scheme  (p.  82). 

13^  When  the  plan  is  abhorrent  to  natural  and  international 
law,  or  to  fidelity  and  faith,  it  may  be  made  known  at  other  courts 
(p.  82). 

14.  Discretion  demands  that  the  blame  be  put  on  the  ministers, 
not  oh  the  sovereign  (p.  82). 

15.  A  state  must  be  particularly  on  its  guard  against  another 
state  in  which  such  a  plot  has  been  discovered,  even  though  it  was 
dropped.    The  same  animus  is  likely  to  hatch  another  (p.  82). 

16.  Measures  for  the  foregoing  purpose  consist  usually  in  advan- 
tageous alliances,  which  are  of  two  sorts,  offensive  and  defensive, 
each  of  which  requires  its  own  sort  of  consideration  (p.  83).' 

17.  Allies  against  a  hostile  power  must  be  sought  among  those 
whose  interests  and  policies  are  identical  with  ours  (p.  86). 

18.  Guarantees,  and  other  treaties,  by  which  free  powers 
promise  aid  in  stipulated  cases,  are  also  means  of  security  for  a 
state  (p.  89). 

19.  Another  protection  against  outbreak  or  extension  of  war, 
is  the  treaty  guaranteeing  the  neutrality  of  a  given  territory  (p.  87). 

20.  Frequently  some  European  power,  under  a  particularly 
energetic  prince,  threatens  to  subordinate  the  rest  of  Europe.  Then 
a  wise  monarch  is  both  privileged  and  bound  to  adopt  means  to 
keep  such  a  prince  within  proper  limits  (p.  88). 

»  Justi  has  a  long  note  on  this  subject  in  which  he  takes  decidedly 
advanced  ground  against  war  except  for  the  most  important  reasons. 
Vide  156,  p.  88,  last  sentence. 


334  THE  CAMERALISTS 

21.  Such  measures  vary  according  to  circumstances,  but  they 
must  not  include  treachery  (pp-  88-90). 

22.  Discreet  conduct  toward  the  other  free  powers  is  not  a 
guarantee  of  external  security,  but  other  means  of  defense  will  be 
required  (p.  92). 

23.  The  chief  of  these  is  an  adequate  army  (p.  92). 

24.  Recruits  from  the  inhabitants  of  the  state  are  preferable  to 
foreign  mercenaries  (p.  93). 

25.  The  army  must  be  in  constant  readiness  for  war  (p.  95). 

26.  There  are  three  ways  to  make  an  army  brave  and  invincible: 
(i)  By  honors  and  rewards,  together  with  appeals  to  love  of  country, 
after  the  example  of  the  Romans;  (2)  by  granting  license  to  plunder 
and  ravish,  as  in  the  case  of  Tamerlain,  Attila,  etc.;  (3)  by  main- 
taining discipline  through  fear  of  punishment.  The  third  only  is 
to  l)e  recommended  (p.  97). 

27.  In  a  well-ordered  state  the  military  budget  must  take  pre- 
cedence of  everything  else  (p.  98). 

28.  The  monarch  should  be  commander-in-chief  of  the  army 
(p.  99). 

29.  Fortifications  are  another  means  of  security  (p.  100).        ti, 

30.  Maritime  nations  also  require  a  fleet  (p.  loi). 

31.  Incidental  to  these  latter,  various  munitions  of  war  must  be 
collected  (p.  102). 

32.  Resort  must  be  had  in  extremes  to  troops  furnished  by 
allies,  and  to  mercenaries  (p.  103). 

33.  It  is  most  advantageous  when  the  allies  make  separate 
invasions  of  the  enemy's  territory  (p.  104). 

34.  It  is  a  question  whether  subsidizing  revolt  in  an  enemy's 
territory  is  a  permissible  means  of  security  (p.  105). 

35.  It  is  permissible  to  destroy  an  enemy's  trade  and  commerce 
(p.  106). 

36.  Non-permissible  means  of  defense  are:  assassination  of  the 
hostile  monarch  or  his  ministers;  bribed  incendiarism,  murder,  or 
similar  treacherous  violence;  poisoned  weapons;  violation  of  truce. 

ON  THE   DOMESTIC  SECURITY  OF  A  STATE 

37.  The  domestic  security  of  a  state  consists  in  such  a  well- 
ordered  constitution  of  the  same  that  all  parts  of  the  civic  body  are 


JUSTFS  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  335 

held  in  their  appropriate  correlation,  and  in  the  consequent  repose, 
while  the  persons  and  property  of  individuals  are  protected  against 
all  injustice  and  violence  (p.  108). 

38.  For  the  above  purpose  each  class  in  the  state  must  be 
required  to  keep  its  appropriate  place  (p.  108). 

39.  The  relation  which  subjects  must  observe  toward  the  state, 
as  well  as  toward  each  other,  is  based  on  a  moral  foundation.  A 
wise  government  therefore  will  have  a  care  for  the  religious  failh 
which  the  people  profess  (p.  109). 

40.  The  state  must  care  for  the  administration  of  justice  (p.  1 10) . 

41.  The  state  must  protect  the  subjects  against  frauds  and  vio- 
lence (p.  III). 

ON  THE  ATTENTION  OF  THE  RULER  TO  THE    EXTERNAL   CONDITION 

OF  CLASSES  AND  THEIR  RELATION  TO  THE  STATE 

AND  TO  ONE  ANOTHER 

42.  No  one  should  be  permitted  to  gain  so  much  power  and 
wealth  that  he  might  be  dangerous  to  the  state  or  to  his  fellow- 
citizens  (p.  112). 

43.  The  ruler  has  nothing  to  fear  from  the  wealth  of  his  subjects 
if  it  is  not  too  unequally  distributed  (p.  113). 

44.  The  ruler  must  first  of  all  give  his  attention  to  securing 
the  best  talent  for  the  high  offices  of  state  and  of  the  army  (p.  114). 

45.  No  officer  should  be  allowed  to  gain  enough  power  to  be 
dangerous  to  the  state  (p.  114). 

46.  Hence  no  officer  should  be  intrusted  with  lettres  de  cachet 
(p.  114). 

47.  Offices  should  not  be  hereditary  (p.  114). 

48.  Neither  at  court  nor  in  the  state  should  there  be  different 
parties  (p.  115). 

49.  No  special  class,  family,  or  single  person  should  be  allowed 
to  gain  so  much  power  that  disobedience  to  the  supreme  power 
would  be  safe  (p.  116). 

$0.  No  one  should  be  permitted  to  possess  fortifications  or 
maintain  an  armed  force  (p.  116). 

51.  Subjects  should  not  be  allowed  to  attach  themselves  to 
foreign  powers  (p.  116).' 

»  A  note  applies  this  proposition  particularly  to  the  Jesuits. 


356  THE  CAMERALISTS 

52.  No  privileges  should  be  permitted  to  subjects  which  arc 
hannful  either  to  the  state  or  to  other  subjects  (p.  117). 

53.  No  class  should  be  permitted  to  monopolize  the  riches  of 
the  country  (p.  119).* 

54.  The  ruler  must  not  disregard  the  feelings  of  the  subjects 
toward  himself  or  his  ministers  (p.  120). 

55.  The  ruler  must  use  all  the  wisdom  possible  in  governing  his 
conduct  in  case  disorders  arise  (p.  121). 

ON    THE    ATTENTION    OF    THE    RULER    TO    THE    MORAL    CONDITION 
OF  SUBJECTS,   PARTICULARLY  THEIR  RELIGION  AND  CONDUCT 

56.  The  moral  condition  of  the  subjects  must  be  such  as  will 
accord  with  the  welfare  of  the  state  (Wohlfahrt  des  Staais),  and  pro- 
mote internal  security  (p.  122). 

57.  The  ruler  must  not  allow  his  own  religious  opinions  to  be 
the  sole  criterion  of  the  goodness  or  badness  of  the  religion  of  his 
subjects;  but  he  must  always  treat  that  religion  as  true  which  has 
been  introduced  by  the  fundamental  principles  and  constitutions  of 
the  state  or  by  the  treaties  of  his  predecessore  (p.  123). 

58.  The  regent  must  nevertheless  attempt  to  establish  unity  of 
faith  among  his  subjects  (p.  124). 

59.  On  the  other  hand  the  welfare  of  the  state  must  be  preferred 
to  unity  of  faith  (p.  124). 

60.  The  ruler  must  prevent  the  introduction  of  opinions  about 
religion  which  are  blasphemous  and  disgraceful,  and  which  tend  to 
demoralize  the  character  of  the  subjects  (p.  125). 

61.  For  the  forgoing  reason,  a  censorship  of  books  must  be 
established  (p.  126).* 

62.  The  ruler  must  try  to  stimulate  the  intelligence  of  his 
subjects  (p.  128). 

63.  The  ruler  should  use  the  thousand  means  which  are  at  his 
disposal  to  put  premiums  on  personal  virtues  of  all  kinds  (p.  128). 

'  Again  a  note  states  that  this  has  special  reference  to  the  Jesuits, 
and  intimates  that  the  author's  teaching  in  this  spirit  in  Vienna  was  one 
of  the  causes  of  his  becoming  persona  non  grata. 

'  The  qualifications  which  Justi  adds  would  seem  to  the  modern 
mind  sufficient  to  nullify  the  profXMition  itself. 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  337 

64.  Yet  the  ruler  must  not  go  so  far  as  to  pry  into  the  family 
life  of  unsuspected  persons  (p.  130). 

65.  The  ruler  must  not  deny  the  subjects  innocent  pleasures 
(P-  131)- 

ON  THE   ADMINISTRATION  OF  JUSTICE 

66.  The  supreme  power  must  adjust  strife  between  subjects 
over  property,  pursuits,  and  transactions,  and  the  decision  must 
rest  on  the  constitution  of  the  republic  and  on  the  principles  of 
morals  (p.  132). 

67.  The  administration  of  justice  is  to  be  distinguished  from 
the  science  of  law.    It  belongs  partly  to  statecraft,  partly  to  Policey 

(P-  132)- 

68.  The  laws  must  correspond  with  the  condition  of  the 
community,  with  the  character  of  the  various  groupings  of  the 
subjects,  and  with  the  particular  purposes  which  a  wise  government 
proposes  (p.  133). 

69.  The  laws  must  be  plain  and  intelligible  (p.  134). 

70.  The  laws  must  be  brief  and  simple  (p.  135). 

71.  Good  laws  will  be  in  vain  unless  the  government  selects  men 
of  high  character  for  judges  (p.  137).' 

72.  Even  then  the  judges  cannot  be  trusted  without  careful 
supervision  (p.  138). 

73.  Before  all  things  the  administration  of  justice  must  be  non- 
partisan (p.  139). 

74.  The  judicial  procedure  must  be  prompt  and  brief  (p.  139). 

75.  It  would  promote  justice  if  the  costs  of  court  procedure 
should  be  defrayed  by  the  state  and  not  by  the  litigants  (p.  140).* 

ON  THE  MEASURES  OF  THE   RULER  FOR   SECURING  THE    PERSONS 
AND  GOODS  OF  SUBJECTS 

76.  Domestic  security  demands  that  the  |)ersons  and  goods 
of  subjects  shall  be  safe  (p.  141). 

•  Justi  cites  the  French  Parliament  as  an  example  of  a  wise  arrange- 
ment of  influence  upon  the  ruler  in  an  unlimited  monarchy,  from  the 
judicial  department.  He  apparently  had  no  suspicion  of  the  verdict 
which  the  Revolution  was  about  to  pass  upon  that  same  Parliament. 

*  Justi  speaks  on  this  point  as  though  he  considered  his  opinion 
utterly  impractical. 


338  THE  CAMERALISTS 

77.  This  safety  must  be  assured  both  against  domestic  and 
foreign  violence  or  fraud  (p.  142).  • 

78.  Nations  frequently  regard  the  traders  of  another  nation  as 
legitimate  booty  (p.  142). 

79.  Nations  sometimes  kidnap,  the  subjects  of  other  nations 
for  soldiers  (p.  143). 

80.  Nations  sometimes  encourage  special  sorts  of  lotteries,  or 
other  fraudulent  schemes  for  obtaining  the  property  of  the  subjects 
of  other  nations  (p.  144). 

81.  The  worst  sort  of  domestic  violence  is  nocturnal  robbery 
and  murder,  whether  on  country  roads,  the  streets  of  cities,  or  in 
private  houses  (p.  145). 

82.  If  we  seek  the  sources  of  these  evils,  they  are  to  be  found 
chiefly  in  the  defective  education  of  youth,  and  in  the  consequent 
excesses  of  adults,  the  scarcity  of  food  in  the  country,  or  the  defective 
impulse  to  perform  remunerative  work,  the  oppression  of  the  land 
under  heavy  taxation  and  other  wrongs  of  government  (p.  145). 

83.  A  wise  ruler  would  not  have  much  difficulty  in  adopting 
measures  which  would  remove  these  conditions  (p.  146). 

84.  Meanwhile  the  minor  civic  officials  must  be  required  to 
keep  sharp  watch  of  criminals  (p.  146).' 

85.  Frequent  visitations  of  roads,  forests,  and  suspicious  houses, 
and  the  use  of  the  militia  on  country  roads  and  at  night  in  the  streets 
of  towns,  are  advisable.  Also  the  closing  of  public  houses  at  an 
appointed  time,  and  sharp  watch  of  them  after  that  hour,  while 
the  watchmen  themselves  must  be  subject  to  the  severest  punish- 
ments, if  they  take  bribes  to  allow  criminals  to  escape  (p.  147). 

86.  Thieves  are  on  the  whole  more  dangerous  to  security  than 
robbers  and  murderers,  and  must  consequently  l>e  zealously  traced 
and  punished  (p.  147). 

87.  Vagabonds  of  all  sorts  must  be  driven  from  the  country 
(p.  148). 

88.  Watch  must  be  kept  at  the  boundaries  against  such  classes, 

'  Again  Justi,  whether  facetiously  or  as  a  mere  excursus  in  academic 
utopianism  it  is  impossible  to  decide,  suggests  that  it  would  be  well  to 
imitate  the  Chinese  custom  of  docking  the  pay  of  officials  if  they  failed 
to  apprehend  robbers  or  murderers  within  six  months  of  the  crime. 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  339 

and  householders  must  be  required  to  reix)rt  the  names  and  circum- 
stances of  the  people  who  lodge  with  them  (p.  149). 

89.  It  is  a  question  whether  a  wise  government  should  tolerate 
Jews.  They  surely  cause  much  harm  by  their  usury  and  sharp 
practices.  Yet  it  is  also  a  question  whether  they  have  not  been 
forced  to  these  and  even  criminal  practices  by  the  policies  of  govern- 
ments toward  them.  Probably  if  they  were  admitted  to  all  means  of 
gaining  a  livelihood  they  would  be  as  useful  to  a  land  as  other  sub- 
jects (p.  150). 

90.  A  wise  government  must  finally  punish  with  severity  all 
other  kinds  of  violence,  such  as  duelling,  outbreaks  of  apprentices, 
and  all  ways  of  taking  private  steps  to  supplant  the  law  in  meting 
out  justice  (p.  151). 

91.  To  prevent  these  evils,  the  law  itself  must  efficiently  treat 
the  conditions  which  they  are  intended  to  correct  (p.  151). 

ON  THE   RICHES   OF  THE  STATE 

92.  Besides  security,  sufficient  wealth  is  necessary  to  the  hap- 
piness of  a  state  (p.  152). 

93.  By  the  wealth  of  a  country  we  understand  a  sufficient  supply 
of  goods  to  satisfy  the  needs  and  conveniences  of  life,  and  by  means 
of  which  the  subjects  by  diligence  and  labor  may  find  adequate 
sustenance  (p.  152).' 

94.  Such  being  the  nature  of  wealth,  if  a  land  yielded  an  abun- 
dance of  such  useful  things,  and  had  no  trade  relations  with  other 
lands,  we  might  call  it  rich,  even  though  it  contained  no  trace  of 
gold  and  silver  (p.  152). 

95.  Because  of  international  transactions  we  need  a  ware 
[PFoare]  which  is  rare,  to  which  all  peoples  assign  equal  value,  which 
is  durable  and  easily  carried,  to  be  used  as  a  universal  means  of  pay- 
ment (p.  153). 

96.  Gold  and  silver  possess  these  qualifications.  Consequently 
a  land  cannot  be  regarded  as  rich  today  unless  it  possesses  a  sufficient 
supply  (genugsame  Mengc)  of  these  metals  (p.  153). 

'  It  is  obvious  at  a  glance  that  this  description  !s  an  unanalyzed 
compound  which  presently  had  to  be  decomposed  into  the  concepts, 
"wealth"  and  "capital." 


34®  THE  CAMERALISTS 

97.  Token  currency  is  in  no  proper  sense  an  addition  to  national 
wealth,  although  it  may  be  a  means  of  increasing  wealth  (p.  154). 

98.  If  a  ruler  could  circulate  token  currency  at  will,  he  could 
gradually  absorb  the  whole  national  wealth  (p.  155). 

99.  Such  currency  ought  not  to  be  used  unless  a  definite  term 
is  fixed  for  its  redemption  (p.  155). 

100.  We  must  distinguish  (a)  the  wealth  of  the  ruler;  (b)  the 
wealth  of  private  persons;   (c)  the  wealth  of  the  land  (p.  155). 

10 1.  Gold,  silver,  and  costly  ornaments  stored  in  the  treasure- 
chests  of  the  monarch  are  of  no  use  to  the  country  and  would  not 
alone  tend  to  remove  the  land  from  poverty  (p.  155). 

102.  The  same  is  the  case  if  there  are  many  rich  persons  in  a 
country  who  either  hoard  their  wealth,  or  keep  it  in  foreign  banks 

(p.  155)- 

103.  The  true  conception  of  national  wealth  then  is  that  it 
consists  of  an  adequate  supply  of  money,  distributed  among  the 
subjects,  employed  in  gainful  pursuits,  and  constantly  passing  from 
one  hand  to  another  (p.  156). 

104.  In  order  that  the  people  may  be  able  by  labor  and  diligence 
not  only  to  support  themselves  but  to  supply  the  needs  of  the  state, 
the  ruler  must  see  (a)  that  all  measures  are  taken  which  secure  the 
necessary  means  of  increasing  wealth;  (b)  that  all  necessary  means 
are  used  to  insure  the  constant  employment  of  this  wealth  in  gainful 
ways,  and  the  circulation  of  it  from  hand  to  hand  (p.  156). 

ON  INCREASE  OF  THE  WEALTH  OF  THE  STATE 

105.  A  State  cannot  increase  its  wealth  without  guarding  what 
it  already  possesses.  The  first  rule  of  a  wise  government  therefore 
should  be  to  prevent  by  all  possible  means  the  unnecessary  removal 
of  money  from  the  country  (p.  157). 

106.  This  involves  stopping,  by  the  court,  of  purchases  of 
foreign  goods  and  discouragement  of  customs  which  tend  to  take 
the  money  of  private  persons  out  of  the  country  (p.  157).* 

<  The  item  chiefly  in  Justi's  thought  at  this  point  is  the  custom  of 
deposit  in  foreign  banks,  and  the  antidote  which  he  proposes  is  such  a 
firmly  established  domestic  bank  system  that  a  premium  will  be  put  on 
keeping  the  funds  at  home. 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  341 

107.  The  second  fundamental  rule  of  a  wise  government  must 
be  that  there  should  be  constant  effort  to  increase  the  wealth  of  the 
state,  for  a  land  cannot  be  too  rich  (p.  158). 

108.  On  the  other  hand  riches  must  not  be  increased  at  the  cost 
of  oppressing  other  peoples,  for  such  means  of  obtaining  wealth 
demoralize  those  who  so  obtain  it.  The  chief  cause  of  the  fall  of  the 
Persian  and  Roman  monarchies  is  to  be  found  in  their  disregard  of 
this  principle  (p.  158). 

109.  There  are  three  chief  ways  of  increasing  the  wealth  of  a 
land:  (i)  the  increase  of  population;  (2)  foreign  commerce;  (3) 
mining. 

ON  INCREASE  OF  THE  POPULATION  OF  A  COUNTRY 

iio.  Increase  of  the  population  increases  the  means  of  a 
country  both  because  the  newcomers  bring  goods  into  the  country, 
and  because  they  stimulate  circulation  of  money  (p.  160). 

111.  It  is  thus  certain  that  large  population  makes  a  state 
prosperous  provided  its  constitution  is  beneficent.'  The  talents  of 
the  persons  in  the  republic,  indeed  the  persons  themselves,  are 
among  the  resources  of  the  state.  The  larger  the  number  of  people 
living  in  the  country  therefore,  the  greater  will  be  the  means  and 
power  of  the  republic.  Hence  the  duty  of  the  ruler  to  promote 
increase  of  population  (p.  160). 

112.  It  is  often  asked  whether  a  population  cannot  become  too 
great,  so  that  some  will  obstruct  the  happiness  of  the  rest.  Nothing 
is  so  unfounded  as  this  objection.  Given  flourishing  commerce, 
manufactures,  and  trades,  with  well-administered  police  and  govern- 
ment in  general,  and  there  is  no  good  reason  why  the  population 
should  stop  at  any  particular  point.  Holland  and  China  are  evidence 
to  this  effect  (p.  161). 

113.  There  is  no  reason  to  fear  that  population  could  overtax 
the  food  supply.  Europe  could  feed  six  times  its  present  popula- 
tion (p.  162). 

■  The  expression  is  "seitte  Beschaffenkeit  und  Regierungsver/assuug." 
This  seems  to  be  one  of  the  rare  cases  in  the  cameralistic  books  of  use 
of  the  term  Ver/assung  very  nearly  in  the  modem  sense.  Vide  above, 
PP-  34,  70. 


342  THE  CAMERALISTS 

114.  If  we  had  wise  police  and  economic  administration,  there 
would  Ije  no  need  of  allowing  emigration  to  America  (p.  163).' 

115.  To  encourage  increase  of  population  the  government  in 
the  first  place  must  be  beneficent  and  mild  (p.  164). 

1 16.  As  a  particular  under  this  generalization,  reasonable  freedom 
must  be  permitted  to  the  subjects  (p.  165). 

T17.  The  growth  of  population  is  scarcely  possible  unless  the 
ruler  permits  complete  freedom  of  conscience  (p.  165). 

118.  Freedom  of  conscience  must  be  distinguished  from  complete 
freedom  of  religious  liberty.  The  latter  is  to  be  granted  only  under 
approved  conditions.  The  former,  consisting  of  rights  of  belief  and 
household  worship,  should  be  allowed  in  so  far  as  it  is  not  harmful 
to  the  state  (p.  165). 

iig.  A  wise  ruler  will  not  leave  the  food  supply  and  employ- 
ment of  subjects  to  take  care  of  themselves,  but  will  see  that  they 
arc  systematically  made  abundant  (p.  167). 

120.  Still  further,  the  government  must  encourage  the  immigra- 
tion of  rich  and  talented  people  of  all  kinds,  and  may  resort  to  titles, 
honors,  ix)sitions,  and  privileges  as  premiums  to  them  (p.  168). 

121.  So  far  as  possible,  the  government  should  relieve  new- 
comers who  wish  to  build,  of  the  taxes,  building-permit  fees,  etc. 
(p.  168).         =,hr    .r-;. 

122.  Special  encouragement  must  be  given  to  skilled  foreigners 
who  wish  to  introduce  into  the  country  desirable  industries  (p.  169). 

123.  The  ruler  should  see  that  the  laws  are  favorable  to  the 
marriage  relation  (p.  lyo).' 

124.  A  wise  Catholic  ruler  will  try  to  limit  the  growth  of  the 
clerical  orders,  for  they  arc  largely  responsible  for  the  unfavorable 
contrast  in  population  between  Catholic  and  Protestant  countries 
(P-  173)- 

*''  «  The  pious  reflection  is  subjoined:  "  Nevertheless  wc  must  bow  to 
the  wise  providence  of  God,  which  perhaps  in  this  way  will  make  the 
most  remote  regions  of  the  earth  moral,  reasonable,  and  enlightened  in 
religion." 

»  Certain  fines  and  penalties  for  celibate  men  are  suggested,  and 
it  is  further  hinted  that  instead  of  requiring  a  payment  to  the  government 
for  permission  to  marry,  a  reward  should  be  given  for  marrying. 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  343 

125.  A  wise  ruler  will  consider  seriously  the  point  of  view  of 
population,  before  entering  into  war.  He  will  especially  encourage 
all  means  of  diminishing  sickness  and  of  preventing  plague  (p.  17,^). 

126.  A  wise  government  will  check  drunkenness  and  other  de- 
moralizing vices  (p.  173). 

127.  The  art  of  medicine  must  be  brought  to  the  highest  efficiency 
(p.  174). 

128.  Surgery,  midwifery,  and  pharmacy  must  for  the  same  reason 
be  encouraged  and  regulated  by  the  government  (p.  175). 

129.  Provision  must  be  made  for  assuring  purity  of  foods  (p.  175). 

130.  The  cleanliness  of  cities  must  be  assured,  and  this  requires 
attention  to  the  building  regulations  (p.  176). 

ON  COMMERCE   WITH   FOREIGN   PEOPLES 

131.  Commerce  is  transactions  in  means  of  sustenance  in  which 
the  goods  and  wares  are  exchanged  with  advantage  either  against  gold 
and  silver,  or  against  other  wares,  and  by  this  process  the  needs  and 
conveniences  of  human  life  are  satisfied.  This  explanation  includes 
everything  which  belongs  to  the  nature  of  commerce  and  to  com- 
prehension of  it  (p.  177). 

132.  Only  foreign  commerce  can  increase  the  wealth  of  a  land 
(p.  178). 

133.  The  first  principle  of  commerce  must  be  that  more  gold 
and  silver  shall  be  brought  in  than  carried  out  by  it  (p.  178). 

OF   KNOWLEDGE   OF  THE   NATURE   OF  COMMERCE 

134.  The  first  distinction  to  be  made  is  between  goods  produced 
at  home  and  those  obtained  from  abroad  (p.  179). 

135.  When  commerce  is  carried  on  with  domestic  wares,  the 
wealth  of  the  land  always  gains  something  by  it,  but  this  kind  of 
commerce  may  nevertheless  be  very  disadvantageous  to  the  state; 
for  if  the  wares  are  carried  from  the  countr)'  in  the  raw  and  untrans- 
formed  condition,  or  are  drawn  from  foreign  nations,  the  land  loses 
considerably  from  the  earnings  and  support  of  subjects  which  might 
have  been  enjoyed  from  the  same  (p.  180).' 

«  This  paragraph  is  translated  as  literally  as  possible;  the  obscurity 
is  in  the  original. 


344  THE  CAMERALISTS 

136.  When  commerce  is  conducted  with  foreign  wares  alone, 
this  is  either  because  these  wares  are  to  be  consumed  at  home,  or 
because  they  are  to  be  traded,  with  profit,  to  other  nations.  The 
first  sort  of  commerce  is  wholly  harmful  to  a  country;  for  although 
the  special  traders,  certain  commercial  cities,  and  the  tariff  and 
excise  accounts  of  the  ruler  may  temporarily  profit,  the  land  as  a 
whole  cannot  gain  anything  by  such  trade.  On  the  contrary,  if  it  has 
no  other  sources  of  wealth,  it  must  gradually  lose  all  its  gold  and 
silver,  and  this  harmful  trade  must  at  last  stop  from  lack  of  means 
of  payment  (p.  180). 

137.  The  second  sort  of  foreign  trade  is  incomparably  more 
profitable  for  the  state  (p.  181). 

138.  There  is  a  great  difference  in  goods  with  respect  to  the 
source,  or  the  lands  from  which  they  are  derived.  The  trader  must 
know  all  about  the  differences,  and  he  must  know  whether  he  receives 
them  from  the  first,  second,  or  third  hand,  and  where  they  can  with 
profit  be  sold.  The  cameralist,  however,  must  know  them  so  far 
that  he  can  judge  what  sorts  are  most  advantageous  for  the  entire 
system  of  commerce,  and  for  domestic  manufacture,  or  with  which 
kinds  the  land  may  most  easily  carry  on  profitable  trade  (p.  182). 

139.  Another  difference  in  wares  springs  from  their  essential 
nature  and  composition.  That  is,  they  may  be  rough  or  fine,  useful 
or  useless,  superfluous  or  necessary,  genuine  or  spurious,  fresh  or 
spoiled,  etc.  Of  all  these  differences,  a  trader  must  be  fully  informed. 
A  civic  official  in  the  commercial  department  must  also  be  somewhat 
intelligent  about  these  things,  in  order  to  promote  the  transportation 
of  the  wares,  and  properly  to  assess  the  duties  and  e.xcises  (p.  182). 

140.  There  are  also  differences  with  respect  to  their  external 
and  accidental  condition;  i.e.,  packed  or  unpacked:  to  be  counted, 
weighed,  or  measured;  salable  or  unsalable  and  contraband — the 
latter  only  temporarily  and  in  time  of  war  forbidden.  Both  mer- 
chants and  cameralists  need  to  be  informed  about  these  details 
(p.  183). 

141.  These  various  sorts  of  goods  occasion  many  sorts  of  trade; 
e.  g.,  the  customary  classification  is:  (i)  Cloth;  (2)  Silk;  (3)  Spices; 
(4)  Groceries  [M aterialien]\  (5)  Hides  and  furs  [Rauch-  und  Pelz- 
handel\\    (6)  Gold,  silver,  or  jewels;    (7)  Books.    This  however  is 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  345 

merely  an  approximate  classification,  for  there  may  be  as  many 
sorts  of  trade  as  there  are  separate  sorts  of  wares.  Indeed  it  is 
advisable  for  a  trader  not  to  deal  in  too  many  wares.  If  he  dares  to 
confine  himself  to  a  single  one  he  can  more  effectively  master  the 
conditions  of  that  trade.  Small  traders  who  have  to  look  out  merely 
for  cost  and  sale  may  carry  a  miscellaneous  stock  (p.  183). 

142.  Trade  comprises  two  chief  types  of  transactions:  (a)  ob- 
taining the  wares;   (b)  marketing  them  (p.  184). 

143.  All  domestic  goods  come  either  from  cultivating  the  earth, 
or  from  stock-breeding,  or  from  industries  [Gewerben].  As  to 
agriculture,  a  wise  merchant  will  either  himself  engage  in  it,  or  by 
advancing  loans,  storage,  and  favorable  contracts  will  seek  to  get 
the  wares  at  a  good  price.  As  to  products  of  stock-raising,  he  may, 
by  cash  payments,  by  courteous  conduct  and  minor  attentions  [eine 
kleine  Ergotzlichkeit],  get  the  good-will  of  the  shepherds  and  other 
country  folk  who  have  such  things  for  sale.  The  wares,  however, 
which  come  from  the  trades,  are  procured  best  through  the  estab- 
lishment of  manufactures  and  factories.  Sometimes  advances  to  the 
manufacturers  and  hand-workers  will  secure  the  goods.  A  wise 
government,  on  the  other  hand,  will  always  see  to  it  that  all  these 
domestic  wares  are  supplied  at  the  required  quality  and  price,  in 
order  that  the  favorable  balance  in  other  countries  may  be  retained 

(p.  184). 

144.  As  to  obtaining  foreign  wares,  they  come  either  by  wagon 
or  by  boat  from  neighboring  lands,  and  in  such  cases  the  factors 
involved  are  essentially  those  just  named;  or  they  are  brought  from 
long  distances  across  seas.  For  that  purpose  the  merchant  must 
either  have  ships  of  his  own,  if  commerce  is  free  to  all,  or  he  must 
buy  shares  in  trading  associations,  or  in  the  great  auctions  he  must 
provide  himself  with  the  needed  wares  (p.  185). 

145.  By  "shares"  [Actien]  we  understand  those  participating 
parts  which  a  great  privileged  trading  society  at  its  organization 
sells  at  a  fixed  price,  in  order  thereby  to  bring  in  the  sums  which 
must  be  used  in  the  trade  of  the  society.  These  shares,  which  there- 
after may  be  resold,  rise  or  fall  in  price,  according  to  the  success  of 
the  society  (p.  185). 

146.  Since  seafaring  is  beset  with  many  dangers,  a  wise  mer- 


346  THE  CAMERALISTS 

chant  will  never  risk  his  whole  resources,  or  a  large  portion  of  them, 
at  one  time  upon  the  waves.  Consequently  it  is  not  only  customary 
for  many  merchants  to  join  in  fitting  out  ships,  but  many  forms  of 
contract  have  been  invented,  such  as  shares  in  ships,  insurance,  etc. 
The  most  important  of  these  is  insurance;  that  is,  another  party 
undertakes  to  assure  the  cargo  of  a  ship  for  a  payment  of  3,  5,  10,  20, 
30,  or  more  per  hundred,  according  to  the  degree  of  danger  to  be 
feared,  and  in  case  of  loss  to  make  it  good  (p.  186). 

147.  The  second  chief  type  of  transaction,  sale,  dejxnds  prin- 
cipally upon  good  correspondents,  who  protect  the  merchant  by 
giving  him  timely  notice  of  rise  and  fall  of  prices  and  other  circum- 
stances which  affect  his  trade.  A  good  merchant  must  be  able  to 
distinguish  between  a  correspondent  who  can  be  relied  upon  to  serve 
his  employer's  interests  and  one  who  is  seeking  chiefly  his  own 
advantages.  The  bourse,  a  house  where  in  great  trading  centers 
the  merchants  daily  meet  to  transact  business,  is  very  prolific  of  such 
reports,  but  they  cannot  be  regarded  with  much  confidence  (p.  187). 

148.  Actual  sale  is  of  various  kinds:  e.  g.,  for  cash  payment, 
on  credit,  on  instalments,  on  exchange,  on  venture,  or  on  speculation 
[a  Vaventure  ou  en  Vair\  or  by  means  of  commission  merchants, 
factors,  fairs  [Messen]  or  similar  devices.  A  merchant  must  be  well 
instructed  about  these  different  sorts  of  trade,  together  with  the  cost 
of  transportation,  tariffs,  probable  dangers,  and  the  prices  to  be 
expected,  in  order  that  by  weighing  these  items  over  against  one 
another  he  may  be  reasonably  assured  of  profits.  He  must  also 
assure  himself  about  the  reliability  of  the  persons  intrusted  with  the 
transportation,  also  concerning  the  warehouses  and  other  circum- 
stances of  the  towns  and  roads  through  which  the  goods  must  pass 
(p.  i86).' 

149.  To  keep  all  these  things  straight,  bookkeeping  is  necessary. 
It  is  customary  to  use  the  following  books:  The  inventory  book; 
the  manual,  or  memorial,  or  chief  book;  the  journal;  the  debt  book; 
the  credit  book;  the  treasury  book;  the  secret  book;  the  stock 
book;  the  expense  book.    All  of  these  must  be  kept  in  the  greatest 

'  To  those  who  imagine  that  commercial  dishonesty  is  of  recent 
growth,  Justi's  note  on  types  of  rascality  which  have  to  be  counted  on 
would  furnish  valuable  information. 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  347 

order,  and  they  must  exactly  correspond  with  one  another.  For 
this  reason,  in  large  concerns  a  special  bookkeeper  is  appointed  ( I) 
(p.  188). 

150.  The  ultimate  purpose  of  all  these  transactions  is,  on  the 
side  of  the  republic,  to  export  goods  produced  in  the  country,  and 
not  needed,  and  therefrom  to  gain  increase  of  wealth,  as  well  as  to 
provide  the  land  with  all  those  goods  which  are  required  for  the 
needs  and  convenience  of  human  life.  On  the  side  of  the  merchant, 
however,  gain  is  the  single  purpose  of  all  his  endeavor.  In  view 
of  the  service  which  he  renders  to  the  state,  of  the  danger  which  he 
incurs,  and  of  the  labors  which  he  undertakes,  we  should  not  begrudge 
his  gains.  They  consist  in  the  increase  of  his  goods  and  of  his  means. 
The  amount  of  his  goods  def)ends  entirely  on  the  value  which  they 
have  in  terms  of  gold  and  silver.  Consequently  the  single  aim  of 
the  merchant  is  to  increase  his  resources  in  gold  and  silver,  or  in 
goods  which  in  comparison  with  these  metals  have  a  great  value 
(p.  188).' 

151.  Gold  and  silver  is  also  in  fact  the  ground  (sic)  of  all 
commerce'  carried  on  in  the  world  or  at  least  among  civilized  or 
somewhat  intelligent  peoples  (p.  189). 

152.  Because  merchants  have  constant  occasion  to  transfer  gold 
and  silver  to  one  another,  a  large  number  of  devices  have  been 
invented  to  serve  their  purposes.  Thus  the  important  exchanges, 
and  the  system  of  bank  credits,  whereby  gold  and  silver  are  trans- 
ferred only  in  imagination,  yet  with  the  same  advantage  to  the 
merchant  as  though  the  metals  were  actually  delivered.  The  essence 
of  the  matter  is  that  one  gives  to  a  third  party  notice  that  the  sum 
due  can  be  drawn  at  a  certain  place.  This  simple  and  natural  way 
of  payment  is  then  by  the  laws,  by  the  different  moneys,  and  other 
circumstances,  surrounded  with  a  multitude  of  formalities  and 
special  details,  which  today  compose  a  considerable  part  of  the 

«  In  such  propositions  as  this,  mercantilism  seems  to  be  less  false 
than  crude  and  unanalyzed. 

»  Transliteration  of  the  vague  term  Grund  is  probably  the  best  way 
of  indicating  the  altogether  immature  character  of  the  thought  in  this 
connection. 


348  THE  CAMERALISTS 

science  of  commerce,  not  only  for  the  merchant,  but  also  for  the 
cameralist  (p.  189). 

153.  A  bank  is  a  public  institution  of  the  state  in  which  mer- 
chants and  other  private  persons  may  at  will  securely  deposit  sums 
of  money,  in  such  a  way  that  they  may  withdraw  the  same  any  hour, 
or  may  use  their  deposits  for  payment  to  other  persons  by  means 
of  the  bank-credit  system.  Banks  of  this  sort  are  called  deposit 
[Giro]  or  exchange  banks,  in  distinction  from  loan  banks  (p.  190). 

153A.  It  must  be  repeated  that  not  money,  but  gold  and  silver, 
is  the  chief  price  and  the  universal  means  of  payment  for  all  goods. 
Money,  so  far  as  foreigners  are  concerned  with  it,  is  in  fact  itself 
nothing  but  a  ware  worth  just  what  the  gold  and  silver  in  it  will 
bring  (p.  191).' 

154.  Those  rulers  who  coin  depreciated  money  miss  their  cal- 
culation in  expecting  to  gain  by  it.  Foreigners  will  take  it  only 
at  its  true  value,  and  even  something  less.  The  bad  money  therefore 
returns  to  the  land  that  coins  it.  It  is  paid  back  by  the  subjects 
into  the  treasury  of  the  ruler,  and  he  deceives  himself  if  he  supposes 
he  has  in  the  treasury  more  than  the  actual  gold  and  silver.  This 
flattering  idea  disappears  as  soon  as  the  attempt  is  made  to  purchase 
abroad.  Meanwhile  the  subjects  who  have  received  the  money 
from  the  ruler  at  the  imaginary  value,  and  who  must  make  foreign 
purchases,  suffer  (p.  191). 

155.  The  persons  engaged  in  trade  are  cither  principals,  sub- 
ordinates, or  auxiliaries.  The  duties  of  each  of  these  classes  must 
be  treated  in  the  special  textbook  on  commercial  science  (p.  192). 

156.  The  fundamental  principles  of  merchants  must  be  dis- 
tinguished from  the  measures  and  purposes  of  the  government. 
While  the  merchant  aims  only  at  gain,  and  is  not  always  concerned 
whether  his  gain  corresponds  with  the  advantage  of  the  state,  a 
wise  government,  on  the  contrary,  must  give  the  chief  attention  to  this 
latter  consideration.  Hence  the  merchants  may  be  much  dissatis- 
fied with  the  regulations  of  trade.  Domestic  manufacture  and  trade 
are  far  less  inviting  to  them  on  this  account  than  the  wclfa*^  of  the 

'  It  is  rather  remarkable  that  Justi  does  not  state  in  the  same 
connection  that  gold  and  silver  are  themselves  essentially  "wares"  like 
any  other. 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  349 

state  demands.  It  is  not  to  be  assumed,  however,  that  the  advantage 
of  the  whole  state  is  incompatible  with  the  prosperity  of  the  mer- 
chants. The  former  may,  however,  require  that  the  advantages 
enjoyed  by  the  latter  shall  be  less  than  at  some  other  periods.  Even 
in  this  case  the  merchants  may  offset  the  restrictions  by  interesting 
themselves  in  promoting  mining,  manufactures,  etc.  (p.  194). 

ON  THE  FOUNDING  AND  THE  PROSPEROUS  CONDITION  OF 
COMMERCE 

157.  No  European  country  is  entirely  without  foreign  commerce, 
but  some  of  it  is  very  harmful,  and  cannot  continue  without  adequate 
increase  of  wealth  from  other  sources  (p.  195).* 

158.  The  establishment  of  commerce  presupposes  that  it  will 
obtain  a  condition  which  promises  permanence  with  advantage  to 
the  state  (p.  195). 

159.  The  founding  of  commerce  is  not  a  mere  matter  of  ap- 
pointing and  encouraging  fairs  and  markets  (p.  195). 

160.  If  at  these  markets  more  foreign  than  domestic  goods  are 
sold,  then  they  are  only  a  great  vortex  from  which  more  gold  flows 
out  than  comes  in,  and  the  town  where  the  fair  is  held  is  the  only 
gainer,  and  it  consequently  holds  on  to  its  advantage  as  long  as 
possible,  in  spite  of  the  general  poverty  of  the  country  (p.  196). 

161.  Prohibition  of  the  exportation  of  money  does  not  secure 
profitable  commerce.  In  the  first  place  it  cannot  be  effective,  in  the 
second  place  it  would  deprive  the  subjects  of  many  things  v.'hich 
their  present  standard  of  life  requires,  and  in  the  third  place  it 
could  accomplish  nothing  of  itself  in  the  direction  of  establishing 
commerce  (p.  196). 

162.  The  first  principle  of  advantageous  commerce  with  foreign 
nations  is,  that  more  gold  and  silver  shall  come  into  the  country  as 
a  result  than  goes  out,  and  on  this  principle  must  all  measures  for 
estiLblishing  useful  commerce  be  founded  (p.  198). 

163.  Since  commerce  must  be  carried  on  either  with  domestic 
or  foreign  goods,  and  since  the  mere  importation  of  foreign  goods 
cannot  possibly  constitute  an  advantageous  trade,  there  follows 
naturally  another  principle,  viz.:  The  value  of  the  domestic  products 

«  Vide  Proposition  13  5,  above. 


35©  THE  CAMERALISTS 

exported  must  exceed  the  value  of  foreign  wares  imported.  The 
inferences  from  these  two  principles  will  give  us  all  the  measures 
necessary  for  the  establishment  of  commerce  (p.  198). 

164.  The  excess  value  of  exports  over  imports  can  be  secured 
in  only  two  ways:  first,  the  quantity  of  imported  foreign  wares  must 
be  diminished;  or,  second,  the  gaining  and  exportation  of  domestic 
products  must  be  increased  (p.  198). 

165.  In  fact  these  two  methods  must  be  combined  in  order  to 
assure  the  result  (p.  199). 

166.  For  this  purpose  a  wise  ruler  must  inform  himself  pre- 
cisely al)out  the  exported  and  imported  wares  and  their  aggregate 
values.  These  facts  must  be  exhibited  in  tables  drawn  from  the 
tariff  and  excise  registers,  so  that  they  can  be  reviewed  at  a  glance. 
For  greater  exactness  the  contents  of  the  tariff  and  excise  registers 
may  be  tabulated  separately  and  compared  with  each  other.  To 
be  still  more  certain,  all  merchants,  artists,  manufacturers,  and  arti- 
sans may  be  required  to  report  what  kinds  of  wares  they  imported 
during  the  previous  year,  and  what  domestic  products  they  sent 
abroad.  By  these  three  processes  together  the  facts  may  be  some- 
what exactly  ascertained  (p.   199). 

167.  We  call  this  casting  the  general  trade  balance.  The 
special  trade  balance  is  a  similar  showing  of  the  imports  and  exports 
Ixitwecn  the  home  and  a  specified  foreign  country.  A  wise  govern- 
ment will  every  year  keep  both  accounts  (p.  200). 

168.  A  wise  ruler  or  his  ministers  will  study  these  tables  to 
discover  whether  among  the  imports  there  are  any  which  could  be 
produced  at  home,  and  thereupon  it  must  be  made  a  fixed  rule  that 
nothing  which  can  be  produced  at  home  shall  be  imported.  The 
necessary  measures  must  then  be  adopted  to  promote  production  of 
lho.se  wares  (p.  200). 

169.  In  this  connection  all  kinds  of  textiles  call  for  attention, 
since  they  are  for  clothing  and  are  accordingly  necessaries  of  life. 
Kvery  land  either  has  materials  for  these,  or  can  easily  get  them. 
Silk-weaving  is  also  possible  in  northern  countries.  Wool  may  be 
grown  everywhere,  and  the  fine  wool  to  be  mixed  with  it  may  be  had 
through  trade,  as  the  English  importation  of  Spanish  wool.  Hence  ' 
such  manufacture  ought  not  to  be  omitted  (p.  201). 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  351 

170.  Yet  foreign  trade  in  such  fabrics  is  not  to  be  expected. 
Our  neighbors,  England,  Holland,  France,  and  Wales,  have  already 
too  long  start  of  us.  But  it  will  be  advantage  enough  if  we  check 
the  import  of  foreign  textiles  (p.  201).' 

171.  The  only  variation  from  the  last  conclusion  is  in  case  we 
can  invent  such  improvement  in  the  fabrics,  that  we  can  make 
foreigners  our  debtors  (p.  202).* 

172.  The  same  principle  holds  in  the  case  of  every  sort  of  ware 
which  might  be  produced  at  home.  As  everything  cannot  be  done 
at  once,  beginnings  should  be  made  in  the  case  of  those  wares  which 
are  most  used  at  home,  and  for  which  the  largest  sums  are  now 
sent  abroad  (p.  203). 

173.  A  second  rule  must  be  kept  in  mind  along  with  the  first, 
viz.,  preference  should  be  given  to  those  industries  which  would 
employ  and  support  the  most  men  (p.  203). 

174.  A  third  rule  should  also  be  followed,  viz.,  to  prefer  those 
industries  for  which  the  raw  materials  are  produced  at  home  (p.  204). 

175.  On  the  other  hand,  those  industries  must  be  stimulated 
which  will  produce  goods  that  foreign  nations  need  (p.  204). ^ 

176.  In  order  to  exploit  these  resources  it  is  necessary  for  the 
government  to  rouse  a  commercial  spirit  among  the  subjects.* 

177.  No  monopolies  in  such  domestic  products,  and  no  similar 
privileges  should  be  granted  (p.  209). s 

'  In  such  propositions  it  appears  that  Justi's  generalization  was 
even  narrower  than  its  usual  form  would  indicate.  The  problem  was 
not  even  that  of  the  type  of  state  then  regarded  as  permanent,  but  of  the 
author's  particular  state. 

«  Justi's  note  on  this  section  is  a  plea  for  governmental  encourage- 
ment of  inventors. 

3  A  considerable  list  follows  of  German  resources  for  such  supply. 

4  The  picture  of  unthrift  and  indifference  which  follows  is  an  im- 
portant piece  of  culture-historical  evidence.  There  is  also  a  pica  for 
Industrial  education  which  has  a  truly  modern  ring,  and  also  suggestions 
about  stimuli  to  individual  effort. 

s  The  reasons  assigned  for  this  rule  make  against  protective  tariffs, 
and  all  the  consequences  which  Justi  suggests  have  been  illustrated  on 
an  enormous  scale  in  recent  years.     JustI  adds  that  this  last  principle 


352  THE  CAMERALISTS 

178.  Assuming  such  measures  for  promoting  domestic  produc- 
tion, a  wise  government  must  give  its  attention  to  measures  for 
inducing  foreigners  to  take  the  wares.  Two  factors  must  be  assured: 
(i)  The  wares  must  have  the  desired  quality;  (2)  the  price  must  be 
satisfactory.  It  may  be  added  that  the  beauty  of  the  wares  is  also 
a  factor  (p.  an). 

179.  In  order  to  insure  the  quality  of  wares,  the  government 
must  not  merely  promulgate  certain  ordinances  and  rules,  but  it 
must  also  appoint  certain  inspectors  who  will  examine  the  completed 
wares,  and  will  mark  with  a  distinguishing  sign  those  which  conform 
to  the  standards  and  those  which  do  not.  In  case,  as  is  certainly 
advisable,  complete  freedom  from  tax  shall  be  permitted  to  exports, 
this  immunity  should  extend  to  those  wares  only  which  satisfy  this 
test  (p.  312). 

180.  It  is  also  often  necessary  to  stimulate  production  by  cer- 
tain prizes  and  rewards,  and  when  the  court  learns  that  science 
or  skill  is  lacking  for  the  production  of  certain  wares,  every  effort 
must  be  made  to  attract  people  with  the  necessary  qualifications, 
or  by  the  necessary  money  payment  to  get  the  lacking  information 
from  a  foreign  artist,  since  everything  may  be  had  for  money  (p.  212).' 

181.  If  the  wares  are  to  be  supplied  at  a  favorable  price,  not  only 
must  the  articles  requisite  for  supplying  the  necessities  of  life  be 
purchasable  at  moderate  prices,  for  on  this  depends  the  amount  of 
the  wages  of  the  laborers,  but  the  raw  material  of  the  wares  must 
also  not  be  dear.  The  ruler  must  accordingly  take  all  possible  care 
that  not  only  agriculture  but  all  the  industries  that  supply  the 
neccessities  of  life  shall  be  in  good  order,  so  that  no  scarcity  shall 
occur,  as  one  industry  always  sustains  another.  Before  all  things, 
however,  those  crafts  which  deal  with  the  necessities  of  life  must 

had  come  to  be  recognized  in  practice  at  his  time.  He  also  remarks  that 
"such  privileges  can  have  no  validity  in  themselves,"  for  it  is  presumed 
that  they  are  to  be  allowed  only  in  so  far  as  they  make  for  the  welfare 
of  the  state,  and  the  successor  to  the  throne  can  in  no  way  be  bound  to 
continue  them.  He  recommends  the  formation  of  a  special  company 
for  exploiting  the  mineral  resources  of  the  country  (p.  310). 

<  In  a  note  Justi  goes  into  considerable  detail  about  the  sort  d 
specifications  that  should  be  prescribed. 


JUSrrS  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  353 

be  held  under  strict  supervision,  in  order  that  they  may  not  raise 
prices  by  charging  excessive  profits,  or  by  buying  up  the  supply, 
and  other  underhanded  means  (p.  214).* 

i8a.  When  so  much  has  been  done  for  stimulation  of  domestic 
production,  it  is  time  to  establish  fairs  and  great  markets  (p.  214). 

183.  But  flourishing  commerce  must  be  described  as  something 
more  than  enough  to  sustain  fairs  and  markets  established  under 
the  foregoing  conditions.  The  expression  is  properly  used  only 
when  flourishing  trade  in  all  sort  of  wares  is  carried  on  with  all 
parts  of  the  worid.  This  is  hardly  to  be  thought  of  unless  it  is 
in  connection  with  extensive  merchant  marine  and  foreign  trade 

(p.  aiS)- 

184.  Assuming  that  the  land  borders  on  the  sea  and  has  good 
harbors,  or  at  least  the  possibility  of  making  them,  or  is  crossed  by  a 
navigable  river  which  is  at  the  command  of  the  country  to  its  mouth, 
the  beginnings  of  sea-trade  may  be  made  by  the  formation  of  a  great 
trading  society,  which  can  collect  the  guarantee  or  the  capital  for 
its  transactions  by  the  sale  of  a  certain  number  of  shares  (p.  216). 

185.  In  order  to  induce  both  natives  and  foreigners  to  take 
shares,  either  very  great  privileges  must  be  granted  to  the  society, 
or  the  bad  condition  and  management  of  foreign  companies  must 
furnish  the  necessary  stimulus,  or  the  court  must  offer  the  company 
material  support. 

186.  The  success  of  such  a  company  depends  principally  upon 
good  management  of  its  affairs.  The  court  must  consequently  do 
its  best  to  insure  the  election  of  directors  whose  insight,  talent, 
diligence,  and  integrity  are  grounds  for  confidence;  and  the  minister 
of  commerce  and  marine,  who  should  possess  all  these  qualities  in 
the  highest  degree,  must  know  how  to  lead  these  directors  in  accord- 
ance with  his  purposes  (p.  217). 

187.  Such  a  company  must  be  guarded  against  dangerous  enter- 
prises and  needless  outlay.  A  few  unfortunate  investments  will 
not  only  ruin  the  company,  but  it  will  be  much  harder  for  the  state 
afterward  to  bring  about  the  formation  of  a  new  company  (p.  217). 

188.  The  power  and  prestige  of  the  monarch  go  far  toward  the 

I  This  paragraph  gives  more  evidence  of  economic  insigfat  than  any 
that  have  preceded. 


354  THE  CAMERALISTS 

success  of  such  a  company.  Other  nations  that  carry  on  foreign 
trade  look  with  jealous  eyes  on  such  a  company,  and  try  in  every 
way  to  put  obstacles  before  it.  The  power  of  the  monarch,  however, 
restrains  them  within  such  limits,  that  they  cannot  openly  antagonize 
it  (p.  217). 

189.  It  is  proper  that  possession  of  a  certain  number  of  shares 
should  be  a  condition  of  sitting  and  voting  in  the  meetings  of  such 
a  company.  It  is  not  so  certain  that  a  similar  condition  should 
hedge  election  of  directors,  because  it  is  not  at  all  certain  that  wealth 
enough  to  own  shares  is  combined  with  the  necessary  qualifications 
for  such  an  office  (p.  218). 

190.  It  is  a  prime  condition  of  success  that  such  companies 
start  with  sufficient  capital  for  large  operations  (p.  218). 

191.  It  must  be  insisted  that  the  predominant  effort  of  such 
companies  should  be  to  sell  domestic  goods  in  foreign  lands.  If 
they  only  bring  in  goods  directly  from  foreign  lands  which  have 
previously  been  bought  from  middle-men,  a  saving  of  middle-men's 
profits  and  of  transportation  charges  of  foreign  ships  is  made,  to  be 
sure;  but  nevertheless  the  money  to  defray  the  first  cost  of  the  goods 
goes  out  of  the  country  (p.  219). 

192.  Such  a  trading  society  must  not  count  on  founding  estab- 
lishments in  distant  lands  at  once,  but  must  plan  to  gain  them  grad- 
ually; i.  e.,  not  until  they  can  pay  good  dividends  to  the  share- 
holders, and  until  there  is  a  comfortable  capital  in  reserve,  so  that 
the  cost  of  foreign  establishments  may  be  covered  out  of  the  reserve 
without  diminishing  the  dividends  (p.  221).  Such  gains  take  large 
fractions  of  the  capital;  societies  formed  by  other  countries,  and 
already  operating  there,  conduct  minor  warfare  with  competitors, 
and  the  monarchs  cannot  regard  their  quarrels  as  sufficient  grounds 
for  actual  war.  If  one  such  society  is  ruined  under  these  conditions, 
it  is  all  the  harder  for  subsequent  ones  to  succeed  (p.  219).' 

193.  When  the  trade  of  such  a  commercial  company  becomes 
flourishing  it  is  possible  to  organize  other  companies  to  operate 
in  the  same  territory  in  particular  lines  of  goods.     It  is  preferable, 

■  Justi  testifies  to  scruples,  which  must  have  passed  as  altogether 
Utopian,  about  the  grounds  in  justice  for  exploiting  the  territories  of 
weaker  people. 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  355 

however,  to  sell  more  shares  and  expand  the  operations  of  a  single 
company.  This  prevents  harmful  jealousies,  cross-purposes,  and 
manifold  loss  of  advantage  by  the  home  company  (p.  223). 

194.  After  all,  such  companies  are  not  absolutely  essential  to 
the  promotion  of  foreign  commerce.  Even  if  they  have  been  used 
to  establish  trade,  the  time  may  come  when  expansion  of  trade  will 
be  best  assured  by  opening  it  freely  to  all  mariners  and  merchants 
(p.  223).' 

ON  THE  AUXILIARIES  [HulfsPtiUel]  TO  COMMERCE 

195.  First  of  all  we  must  name  among  the  conditions  of  pro- 
moting commerce,  a  mild  government,  and  reasonable  freedom  of 
conscience  and  action,  as  in  the  case  of  domestic  prosperity.'  People 
engaged  in  foreign  trade  must  for  special  reasons  enjoy  these  immu- 
nities, because  they  have  special  facilities  for  withdrawing  their  wealth 
from  the  country  (p.  225). 

196.  Second,  a  wise  ordering  of  the  tarifT  and  excise  system 
is  the  principal  means  by  which  a  wise  government  can  guide  foreign 
commerce  according  to  its  purposes.  Instead  of  being  detrimental 
to  trade,  since  traders  always  have  their  own  interest  in  view  more 
than  that  of  the  state,  and  it  would  be  ruinous  to  leave  the  ways  and 
means  of  commerce  to  their  enterprise,  no  trade  can  be  carried  on  in 
a  way  that  is  advantageous  to  the  state  which  is  not  in  this  way 
guided,  controlled,  and  to  a  certain  extent  promoted  (p.  226). 

197.  For  purposes  of  tariflf  and  excise,  wares  are  of  three  classes: 
(i)  for  export;  (2)  for  import;  (3)  for  transport.  Wares  of  the 
first  class  are  either  fully  manufactured,  or  in  raw  or  partially  manu- 
factured condition;  those  of  the  second  cla.ss  are  either  indispensable 
or  dispensable.  Accordingly  the  tariff  and  excise  laws  must  take 
account  of  five  classes  of  wares,  and  this  makes  five  primary  rules 
necessary  (p.  227). 

198.  Rule  1. — All    exports    of    tnanufactured   goods    must   be 

»  Just!  fortifies  this  opinion  by  citing  the  opposition  in  England  to 
the  great  trading  companies,  and  he  expresses  the  judgment  that  they 
had  become  more  harmful  than  useful  to  the  British  Empire.  On  the 
other  hand  he  thinks  it  is  not  time  for  Holland  to  abolish  the  Dutch 
East  India  Company  (p.  225). 

»  Vide  a.hove,  Propositions  115-18. 


356  THE  CAMERALISTS 

burdened  with  light  imposts.  The  one  profitable  kind  of  trade 
consists  in  commerce  of  this  class,  and  a  wise  ruler  must  not  merely 
take  care  that  the  goods  themselves  are  of  high  quality,  but  he  must 
see  that  foreigners  are  stimulated  to  take  them.  It  is  poor  encour- 
agement to  foreign  buyers  to  lay  a  tax  on  such  goods.  The  exporta- 
tion is  of  itself  such  an  advantage  to  the  state,  that  it  is  unnecessary 
to  burden  it  with  imposts  which  make  against  the  ultimate  use  of 
exportation  (p.  227).* 

199.  The  only  exception  to  this  rule  is  in  case  the  home  products 
are  so  cheap,  or  transportation  is  so  cheap  and  easy,  that  the  exports 
can  undersell  competing  products  of  foreign  countries.  Even  in 
this  case,  export  taxes  should  not  be  imposed  on  articles  the  home 
production  of  which  is  capable  of  indefinite  expansion.  It  is  better 
to  give  the  home  merchants  the  opportunity  to  make  the  profit,  so 
that  they  will  be  stimulated  to  increase  the  volume  of  trade  to  the 
utmost  (p.  228). 

200.  Another  corollary  from  this  rule  is  that  very  low  imposts 
should  be  placed  on  raw  materials  when  they  are  moved  from  one 
part  of  the  country  to  another  for  the  purpose  of  being  manufactured 
(p.  229). » 

201.  Rule  2. — Export  of  raw  material  which  is  a  home  product 
must  either  be  heavily  taxed  or  entirely  prohibited  (230). 

202.  Rule  3. — All  imports  of  dispensable  wares  must  carry 
heavy  imposts;  for  if  they  are  really  dispensable  the  importation 
brings  the  country  great  harm  by  useless  foreign  expenditure  of  money 

(p.  23l).3 

203.  Rule  4. — Imports  of  indispensable  wares  should  bear  only 
light  imposts.  Tariff  and  imposts  should  not  be  the  ordinary  way 
of  collecting  tribute  from  the  subjects.  They  are  justified  as  a 
source  of  revenue  only  by  some  subsidiary  purpose.  Their  main 
purpose  should  be  to  direct  the  course  of  commerce  (p.  231). 

■  Justi  cites  the  wisdom  of  countries  which  put  premiums  on  expor- 
tation. 

*  Justi's  illustration  of  harm  to  the  book  trade  through  taxation  of 
p>aper  might  be  quoted  as  prophetic. 

3  The  author's  discriminations  between  degrees  and  types  of  dis- 
pensability are  sociologically  interesting. 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  357 

304.  It  follows  that  foreign  raw  material  needed  for  chief  or 
subordinate  purposes  in  home  manufacture  should  be  free  of  import 
duties  (p.  232). 

205.  Rule  5. — Goods  in  transport  should  be  free  of  imposts, 
with  the  exceptum  of  trifling  toUs  (p.  232). 

206.  The  only  exception  to  this  rule  is  when  the  carriage  of  an 
article  through  the  country  takes  a  market  away  from  a  home  product, 
in  which  case  we  must  be  sure  that  imposition  of  high  taxes  would 
not  lead  to  reprisals  (p.  232). 

207.  All  the  servants  of  the  taxing  system  must  be  held  under 
strict  discipline,  both  against  'peculation,  and  against  needless 
vexation  of  travelers  (p.  233). 

208.  Commerdal  treaties  with  foreign  countries  are  the  next 
most  important  means  of  promoting  commerce  (p.  235). 

209.  Next  in  order  are  good  harbors  and  roads,  and  passable 
rivers  and  canals  (p.  236). 

210.  A  well-organiased  system  of  posts,  boats,  and  land  carriers 
is  a  further  desideratum  (p.  237). 

211.  The  coinage  is  an  essential  factor  of  flourishing  trade 
(p.  238).* 

212.  Unpartisan  and  prompt  rendering  of  justice  in  all  trade 
litigation  greatly  promotes  business  (p.  240). 

213.  To  this  end  special  commercial  courts,  both  original  and 

I  For  its  bearing  on  the  content  of  Justi's  mercantilism,  the  note  at 
this  point  is  worth  translating  in  full,  viz.:  "There  can  be  no  doubt  that 
a  low  rate  of  exchange  is  very  harmful  for  a  country,  and  there  are  two 
chief  circumstances  which  put  the  exchange  of  a  country  on  a  bad  foot- 
ing: (i)  when  it  must  annually  pay  a  large  sum  to  other  nations  to 
settle  the  trade  balance;  (a)  when  its  coinage  is  depreciated.  A  land 
which  finds  itself  in  these  bad  conditions  is  in  a  sorry  plight.  Bad  will 
go  toward  worse  through  the  workings  of  exchange.  All  in  all  the  coin- 
age today  is  in  an  unspeakably  bad  condition.  Under  it  twenty  million 
people  suffer  extreme  disadvantage,  and  only  in  the  neighborhood  of 
fifty  dealers  in  coin  [MilHtlieferanteH]  and  fifty  money-changers  enrich 
themselves  as  leeches  by  sucking  the  blood  of  their  neighbors.  In  such 
a  situation  it  would  be  a  thousand  times  better  that  we  had  no  coinage 
at  all,  but  simply  settled  our  balances  in  gold  and  silver  by  weight " 
(P-  a39)- 


358  THE  CAMERALISTS 

appellate,  should  be  organized.  They  should  be  composed  in  part 
of  legal  experts,  in  part  of  merchants,  capable  of  bringing  the  most 
exact  technical  knowledge  to  interpretation  of  the  laws  (p.  240). 

214.  The  most  flourishing  commerce  is  hardly  possible  unless 
the  ruler  organizes  a  special  bureau  of  commerce.  This  must  be 
composed  of  members  who,  along  with  proved  integrity,  fidelity,  and 
wisdom,  possess  complete  knowledge  of  trade,  and  especially  of 
civic-commerctal  science;  and  it  is  particularly  advisable  that  no 
merchants  should  be  members  of  the  bureau,  because  their  purposes 
are  often  different  from  those  of  the  state.*  In  the  largest  countries 
a  special  subordinate  bureau  may  be  organized  for  manufactures. 
In  this  bureau  former  merchants  and  mining  experts  may  be  useful. 
In  both  bureaus  individuals  must  be  placed  in  charge  of  divisions 
of  operations  with  which  they  are  particularly  acquainted,  and 
consequently  only  the  most  important  and  general  matters  should 
be  handled  by  the  whole  body.  In  every  important  seaport  or 
commercial  center  there  should  be  at  least  one  commercial  councilor, 
to  supervise  commercial  and  manufacturing  relations  at  that  point 
under  the  provisions  of  the  two  bodies  (p.  240). 

215.  Finally,  a  wise  government  must  take  care  to  remove  all 
obstacles  which  may  embarrass  commerce.  These  may  come 
either  from  foreign  or  domestic  causes.  Thus,  under  the  former 
head,  war  between  other  powers,  with  incidental  hindrances  to  our 
commerce;  secret  machinations  of  other  powers  against  our  foreign 
traders,  etc'  Among  domestic  hindrances  may  be  named:  Scarcity 
of  materials  for  shipbuilding  and  other  production;  lack  of  capital 
in  the  country;  existing  privileges  of  certain  lands  and  towns  in  the 
matter  of  imports  and  exports  of  staples;  the  envy  and  jealousy  of 
certain  lands  and  towns  toward  one  another,  etc.  (p.  241). 

ON  MINES  AS  A  MEANS  OF  INCREASING  THE  WEALTH  OF  A  COUNTRY 

The  plan  of  this  study  excludes,  as  far  as  practicable, 
consideration  of  opinions  about  merely  technical,  adminis- 

•  Vide  Prop.  156. 

*  A  naive  discussion  follows  in  a  note,  as  to  whether  the  spirit  of  the 
Christian  religion  permits  a  state  to  buy  immunity  from  piracy  of  non- 
Christian  powers;  and  the  comforting  conclusion  is  reached  that  the 
Christian  religion  surely  cannot  oppose  any  arrangements  which  make 
for  the  real  welfare  of  the  state  (p.  243). 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  359 

trative,  or  operative  details.  We  are  concerned  with  the 
main  problems  which  cameralism  proposed,  and  the  relation 
of  the  formulas  and  solutions  which  cameralism  offered  to  the 
development  of  social  science  in  general.  In  order  to  fix 
with  certainty  the  meaning  of  the  essential  theories,  we  must 
admit  much  evidence  that  is  contained  in  subordinate  details. 
The  importance  of  these  minor  applications  in  the  routine 
rules  of  the  cameralists  diminishes  from  this  point,  as  we  have 
already  epitomized  the  cardinal  doctrines  which  reflected  the 
peculiar  circumstances  of  the  period,  and  which  were  modified 
after  the  circumstances  changed.  At  the  same  time,  we  have 
seen  in  these  characteristic  theories  some  of  the  presumptions, 
both  theoretical  and  practical,  which  have  retained,  and  in 
some  ways  have  gathered  force  in  later  German  thinking. 
These  views  have  encouraged  tendencies  in  German  policy 
which,  for  better  or  for  worse,  have  produced  evident  con- 
trasts between  the  civic  and  economic  systems  of  Germany 
on  the  one  hand  and  of  England  and  America  on  the  other. 
It  will  not  be  necessary  to  reproduce  the  remainder  of  Justi's 
system  as  fully  as  the  sections  have  been  represented  thus  far. 
It  is  in  point  however  to  translate  in  full  the  opening  para- 
graphs of  the  portion  devoted  to  mining.  The  redundancy 
of  statement  is  a  fair  index  of  Justi's  usual  style.  He  says 
(pp.  243  ff.): 

We  come  now  to  the  third  chief  means  by  which  the  riches  of  a 
country  may  be  increased,  viz.,  mining,  whenever  the  natural 
resources  of  the  country  include  mineral  deposits.  In  Germany 
these  resources  are  by  no  means  rare.  Few  states  of  any  size  in  our 
Fatherland  are  without  them.  Yet  the  population  of  most  parts  of 
the  country  lacks  inclination  to  develop  the  mines,  and  the  govern- 
ments have  not  taken  adequate  interest  in  this  source  of  riches. 
Nevertheless  this  is  almost  the  sole  way  in  which  well-founded  hopes 
may  be  cherished  of  increasing  the  riches  of  the  country.  Germany 
has  at  only  a  few  points  facilities  for  navigation.  In  this  respect, 
as  well  as  in  manufactures,  our  neighbors  have  such  a  long  start 


36o  THE  CAMERALISTS 

of  us,  that  we  should  be  very  foolish  if  we  reckoned  on  more  through 
these  means  than  merely  retaining  our  money  at  home.  Since, 
moreover,  the  neighboring  countries  are  giving  more  and  more 
attention  to  keeping  their  rich  inhabitants  at  home,  our  mining 
operations  are  in  fact  the  only  probable  means  by  which  riches  in 
the  various  states  of  Germany  may  be  increased. 

Since  in  our  enlightened  times  the  intelligence  requisite  for  the 
government  of  states  has  greatly  increased,  almost  all  European 
states  are  exceptionally  alert  to  prevent  the  outflow  of  money  from 
the  country.  In  France,  England,  and  Holland,  careful  reckoning 
is  kept  of  the  wares  annually  sold  to  foreign  nations,  and  of  the 
wares  bought  from  the  same  nations.  If  attention  to  these  subjects 
continues,  in  fifty  years  it  may  easily  occur  that  commercial  treaties 
will  set  limits  to  the  amount  of  goods  that  a  nation  may  annually 
take  from  another.  The  same  foresight  will  be  used  with  reference 
to  the  other  ways  by  which  money  is  drawn  from  the  country.  There- 
upon the  mines  will  be  the  only  means  of  increasing  the  wealth  of 
the  country.  This  resource  alone  is  completely  in  our  power,  and 
no  counter-enterprises  of  foreign  peoples  can  restrict  us  in  exploiting 
the  same,  or  can  make  it  valueless. 

The  mines  not  only  increase  the  treasure  of  the  country  with 
respect  to  the  amount  of  gold  and  silver  which  they  extract  from  the 
earth,  but  they  also  furnish  us  the  prindpal  wares  with  which  we 
may  expect  to  establish  advantageous  foreign  commerce.  In 
addition  to  this  the  mines  will  support  a  multitude  of  people,  and 
this  will  have  further  an  important  influence  upon  the  i^ane  of 
living  in  the  whole  population.  Especially  will  the  mountainous 
regions  be  populated  and  exploited  to  the  benefit  of  the  revenues 
of  their  districts  and  of  the  whole  state,  while  the  same  districts, 
without  mines,  would  usually  have  a  barren  and  empty  appearance. 
All  this,  it  seems  to  me,  furnishes  more  than  superfluous  proof  of 
the  great  utility  of  the  mines. 

Who  then  can  doubt  that  the  mines  deserve  the  special  attention 
of  a  wise  government  ?  So  soon,  therefore,  as  minerals  are  foimd 
in  a  country,  or  as  good  evidences  of  them  appear,  or  when  informa- 
tion is  at  hand  that  in  eariier  times  mines  had  been  operated  there, 
a  ruler  who  is  really  concerned  for  the  best  good  of  his  state  will  make 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  361 

it  a  principal  rule  to  establish  mining  and  to  develop  it  to  the  utmost. 
To  that  end  he  must  seize  upon  all  useful  and  efficient  measures. 
I  shall  now  do  my  best  to  show  what  such  measures  must  be. 

Propositions  more  summary  in  form  than  those  in  the 
series  up  to  this  point  will  sufl&ciently  indicate  the  scope  of  the 
discussion,  viz. : 

2i6.  Precious  metals  should  be  mined  with  the  aid  of  govern- 
ments even  at  a  loss  (p.  246).' 

217.  This  is  not  a  loss  for  the  state  as  a  whole.  The  sums 
expended  remain  in  the  country  and  support  many  people.  The 
country  as  a  whole  will  be  richer  by  the  amount  of  gold  and  silver 
that  is  taken  from  the  earth  (p.  246). 

218.  In  case  of  the  other  metals,  even  a  small  profit  should 
justify  mining.  By  furnishing  material  to  be  sold  abroad  they  add 
to  the  nation's  wealth  as  truly  as  the  mining  of  gold  and  silver. 

219.  The  measures  to  be  adopted  by  rulers  for  promoting 
mining  fall  into  three  groups:  (i)  for  stimulating  the  population  to 
engage  in  mining;  (2)  for  standardizing  the  operation  of  mines; 
(3)  for  promoting  mining  science  (p.  247). 

220.  Although  all  mining  rights  belong  to  the  ruler,  yet  he 
cannot  woric  them,  because  that  would  too  greatly  enlarge  his  budget, 
and  make  his  income  uncertain.  The  first  requisite,  then,  is  proc- 
lamation of  free  mining  rights,  subject  to  the  laws  of  the  land,  at 
least  to  citizens,  with  reserve  of  the  rightful  royalties  to  the  govern- 
ment (p.  247). 

221.  The  ruler  should  give  assurance  that  he  will  not  himself, 
or  through  his  ministers,  engage  in  mining  (p.  248). 

222.  The  ruler  must  take  care  in  many  ways  that  those  who 
operate  mines  shall  be  free  to  carry  on  their  enterprise  under  the 
most  favorable  conditions  (p.  249). 

223.  The  government  must  assist  unprofitable  mines,  by  remitting 
dues,  etc.  (p.  250).* 

>  This  doctrine  goes  back  to  Schroder,  loc.  cit.,  chap.  Ixv. 

»  The  idea  here  proves  to  be,  not  that  mines  should  be  operated  if 
the  net  outcome  is  to  be  a  loss,  but  that  mines  at  first  unprofitable  should 
be  assisted  until  they  can  be  made  to  pay. 


362  THE  CAMERALISTS 

224.  Many  changes  in  the  mining  laws  are  necessary,  especially 
because  the  introduction  of  machines,  etc.,  has  changed  conditions 
(P-  251). 

225.  An  area  of  "at  least  two  miles"  should  be  assured  for 
the  operations  of  a  new  mine  (p.  252).' 

226.  This  plan  is  recommended  only  for  the  precious  and  base 
metals  (p.  253). 

227.  For  salts,  coloring  matter,  and  clays,  commercial  societies 
are  preferable  (p.  254). 

228.  Schools  of  mines  should  be  founded  to  train  future  man- 
agers of  mines  (p.  256). 

229.  It  will  be  useless  to  count  on  mines  as  a  permanent  source 
of  wealth  unless  provision  is  made  for  keeping  up  the  supply  of  wood. 

ON  THE  CIRCULATION  OF   GOLD   IN   THE  TRADES 

230.  It  is  not  enough  that  there  should  be  wealth  in  the  country, 
but  the  ruler  must  take  care  that  this  wealth  is  constantly  active 
in  the  trades,  and  that  it  passes  from  hand  to  hand,  for  the  true  wealth 
of  the  country  depends  wholly  upon  this.  In  this  way  the  subjects 
are  put  in  a  fwsition  not  merely  by  diligence  and  labor  to  provide 
for  their  need  and  comfort,  but  also  bear  their  share  toward  sup- 
plying the  needs  of  the  state.  In  fact  it  is  quite  natural  to  represent 
a  republic  under  the  figure  of  a  human  body.  Wealth  is  the  blood, 
the  trades  are  the  arteries,  and  the  government  is  the  heart,  into 
which  from  time  to  time  the  wealth  circulating  in  the  arteries  flows, 
and  thence  again  pours  into  all  parts  of  the  civic  body  through  the 
outlays  of  the  state.  We  have  now  to  treat  of  the  means  by  which 
this  circulation  is  promoted  (p.  259).' 

231.  The  chief  means  of  promoting  circulation  of  money  in  the 
trades  are  four,  viz.:  (i)  that  the  sources  of  subsistence  shall  be 
kci)t  in  good  correlation;  (2)  that  the  land  shall  keep  its  credit  high; 

'  This  apparently  means  two  German  miles  square,  and  Justi 
rcrommends  that  such  a  reservation  should  be  divided  into  four  or  five 
hundred  parts,  whether  for  separate  operation  or  merely  in  dividing  the 
pro<  ccfls  is  not  clear. 

'  This  paragraph  is  translated  in  full  because  it  is  a  characteristic 
cxpres.sion  of  mercantilism,  and  contains  its  own  evidence  that  the  theory 
was  not  so  definite  as  tradition  has  made  it. 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  363 

(3)  that  manufacture  and   artisanship  shall   be   kept   prosperous; 

(4)  that  idleness  and  beggary  shall  be  abated  (pp.  259-330).' 

One  or  two  incidental  symptoms  occur  among  the  tech- 
nological rules,  in  these  sections.  For  example,  while  reiter- 
ating the  precept  against  allowing  money  to  flow  out  of  the 
country,  Justi  adds:  "A  flourishing  condition  of  the  occupa- 
tions by  which  the  necessities  of  life  are  gained  is,  however, 
the  real  strength  and  health  of  the  state."  This  perception 
again  challenges  the  current  reputation  of  mercantilism. 

Justi  denounces  abstract  science,  and  demands  that  the 
learned  class  shall  abandon  profitless  refinements  and  devote 
itself  to  the  useful  arts.  He  would  also  have  the  government 
weed  out  the  student  ranks  by  examinations  difficult  enough 
to  reduce  the  numbers  of  would-be  scholars  (p.  274). 

After  discussing  at  length  the  desirability  and  means  of 
preventing  idleness  and  luxury,  he  adds  a  qualification  which 
is  symptomatic  of  mercantilism  in  particular  and  of  the  prc- 
vaiUng  economic  naivete  in  general.    He  says  (p.  328): 

I  will  go  further,  and  assert  that  the  government  has  no  need 
of  prohibiting  extravagance  and  luxury.  According  to  all  rational 
principles  it  is  entirely  a  matter  of  indifTerence  to  the  state  in  whose 
hands  the  wealth  of  the  country  rests,  if  it  is  only  in  the  country  and 
is  distributed  in  projDcr  proportions  among  the  different  classes  and 
orders  of  the  subjects.  Moreover,  if  the  things  with  which  extrava- 
gance is  practiced  are  not  imported  from  foreign  countries,  it  is  a 
blunder  to  suppose  that  extravagance  is  harmful  to  the  state.  On 
the  contrary  the  circulation  of  money  and  the  support  of  the  citizens 
are  promoted  by  it.  Everything  therefore  which  the  government 
needs  to  care  for,  is  that  those  wares  and  things  which  arc  used  in 

>  These  sections  are  almost  exclusively  composed  of  rule-of-thumb 
conclusions  about  practical  details.  They  presuppose  the  essentially 
patriarchal  conception  of  the  state  which  we  have  called  the  major 
premise  of  cameralism.  The  state  being  the  housewifely  patron  saint 
of  the  people,  specifications  of  the  supervision  to  be  exerted  depend  on 
their  efficiency  in  promoting  the  chief  end  of  such  a  state. 


364  THE  CAMERALISTS 

extravagance  shall  be  produced  at  home,  not  imported  from  abroad. 
A  state  composed  wholly  of  misers,  or  frugal  people,  and  in  which 
no  luxury  existed,  would  necessarily  be  the  poorest,  weakest,  and 
most  miserable  state  under  the  sun.  It  would  not  be  able  to  employ 
and  sup()ort  a  fourth  j)art  of  the  population  of  present  states.  How 
many  occupations  would  remain  if  we  should  restrict  ourselves 
strictly  to  necessities?  Luxury  in  the  use  of  domestic  products,  if 
it  is  conjoined  with  industry,  is  the  natural  heat  and  fire  in  the  civic 
body,  which  gives  it  activity  and  vitality.  Very  few  cases  will  be 
found  in  which  repression  of  luxury  is  required  in  the  interest  of  the 
welfare  of  the  state.  I  have  treated  these  cases  in  the  GrundscUzen 
der  Policey. 

OF  THE   DUTIES  OF   SUBJECTS   IN  ORDER  TO  ASSIST  THE   RULER  IN 
PRESERVING   AND   INCREASING  THE   RICHES   OF  THE  STATE 

232.  The  nature  of  a  republic  necessarily  involves  common 
and  harmonious  obligations,  for  wJien  the  subjects  have  placed  over 
tliemselves  a  supreme  power  («c),'  from  which  they  demand  that  it 
shall  promote  their  happiness,  they  are  naturally  bound  to  conform 
to  those  arrangements  which  that  supreme  power  adopts  for  their 
happiness,  and  to  promote  them  in  every  way,  otherwise  they  would 
obstruct  their  own  ultimate  purposes  (p.  333). 

233.  By  subjects  we  understand  all  those  who  enjoy  the  pro- 
tection of  the  state.  This  brief  proposition  gives  us  the  clearest 
idea  of  the  essential  characteristics  of  a  subject,  and  in  fact  no  more 
essential  finding  mark  can  be  determined  than  the  enjoyment  of 
protection  (p.  334). 

234.  The  right  cannot  be  denied  to  a  ruler  to  demand  that  all 
those  who  possess  estates  in  his  land  shall  either  be  jxjrmanently 
domiciled  upon  them,  or  shall  sell  the  estates  to  some  person  agree- 
able to  him  fp.  340). 

235.  Subjects  owe  their  duties  to  an  unlimited  monarch  only 
when  he  docs  not  act  as  an  enemy  of  the  people.  This  situation 
may  never  have  occurred,  because  even  the  greatest  tyrants  had 
apparent  excuses,  and  it  is  consequently  never  quite  clear  that  an 
autocrat  is  acting  as  the  enemy  of  his  people  (p.  345). 

'  The  Italics  are  mine,  and  the  proposition  is  quoted  for  its  bearing 
ufxjn  our  interpretation  of  Justi's  fundamental  political  conception!. 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  365 

336.  Under  mixed  forms  of  government  the  subjects  owe  duties 
not  to  the  monarch  alone,  but  also  to  the  whole  state,  and  to  the 
fundamental  laws  of  the  same.  Consequently  duty  to  the  monarch 
is  not  a  valid  plea  in  extenuation  of  action  harmful  to  the  estates 

(P-  347)- 

337.  Duties  of  subjects  are  accordingly  of  two  classes:  (a) 
immediate  duties  to  ruler  or  state,  springing  from  the  essential  nature 
of  the  relation  of  subjects;  {h)  mediate  duties  toward  ruler  and  state, 
i.  e.,  such  as  subjects  owe  primarily  to  themselves,  and  thus  second- 
arily to  ruler  and  state. 

OF  THE  IMMEDIATE  DUTIES  OF  SUBJECTS  TOWARD  RULER 
AND  STATE 

338.  The  immediate  duties  of  subjects  toward  ruler  and  state 
are  those  which  are  necessarily  connected  with  the  ultimate  purposes 
of  the  republic  and  with  the  relation  of  subjects,  and  which  subjects 
owe  to  the  supreme  power  in  the  state  alone  (p.  349). 

339.  These  immediate  duties  fall  into  three  chief  classes: 
(a)  exact  obedience  to  the  laws,  commands,  and  ordinances  of  the 
supreme  power;  (6)  unimpeachable  loyalty  to  the  same;  (c)  con- 
tribution according  to  ability  to  the  support  and  best  welfare  of  the 
state  (p.  349).» 

340.  Loyalty  [Treue]  consists  of  complete  devotion,  attachment, 
and  reverence  toward  the  supreme  power,  with  careful  endeavor  to 
avoid,  and  so  far  as  possible  to  assist  in  preventing  everything 
which  might  be  harmful  to  the  external  and  internal  security  of  the 
state  and  of  the  person  of  the  ruler  (p.  376)." 

341.  Subjects  are  released  from  loyalty  to  a  ruler  (i)  through 
absorption  by  conquest  or  otherwise  into  another  country  (p.  393) ; 
(3)  when  the  ruler  abdicates  (p.  397).' 

>  The  immediately  following  sections  are  a  diversified  homily  on 
the  fundamental  virtue  of  obedience,  with  extreme  claims  for  the  arbitrary 
rights  of  rulers  (pp.  351-73). 

*  Again  the  treatment  is  rather  hortatory  than  scientific. 

3  The  third  type  of  duty  (vide  Prop.  239c)  is  discussed  in  variations 
of  commonplaces  adapted  to  the  particular  conception  of  the  state  on 
which  cameralism  was  based  (pp.  402-28).  The  following  division, 
"On  the  Indirect  Duties  of  the  Subject,"  exploits  the  homely  virtues  of 
the  thrifty  type  (pp.  4»9-35)- 


366  THE  CAMERALISTS 

242.  In  order  to  treat  at  length  of  the  mediate  duties  of  sub- 
jects, we  must  elaborate  the  whole  housekeeping  art  [HausIuU- 
tungskunsi]  since  the  obligation  to  operate  well  with  our  resources 
can  be  fulfilled  in  no  other  way  than  through  the  rules  which  this 
Haushaltungskunst  teaches.  But  Oekonomie^  belongs  in  the  system 
of  the  sciences  which  we  have  undertaken  to  expound,  because 
through  the  exercise  of  the  same  the  resources  of  the  state  are  main- 
tained and  increased.  On  that  account  it  is  the  more  evident  that 
all  the  sciences  pertaining  to  government  and  to  the  large  manage- 
ment [Wirthschaft]  of  the  state  hang  together  most  exactly  in  a  single 
system.  Attempting  therefore  to  treat  of  Haushaltungskunst  com- 
pletely and  thoroughly,  so  far  as  the  limits  of  the  present  work 
permit,  we  shall  in  the  first  place  present  the  general  doctrines  of  the 
same,  then  we  shall  treat  particularly  the  two  chief  topics  of  Oeko- 
nomie,  viz.,  urban  economy  and  rural  economy^  and  shall  apply  to 
them  the  general  rules  (p.  435).' 

243.  The  name  Haushaltungskunst  or  Oekonomie  may  really 
be  applied  to  two  distinct  sciences.  When  we  speak  of  the  Oekonomie 
of  the  country,  or  of  the  great  management  [Wirthschaft]  of  the  state, 
all  the  sciences  are  involved  which  we  treat  in  this  book.  When  we 
talk  of  Oekonomie  or  Haushaltungskunst  simply,  we  mean  that 
science  which  we  are  now  about  to  explain,  and  which  is  concerned 
with  the  goods  and  with  the  gainful  occupations  of  private  persons. 
Haushaltungskunst  is,  however,  a  science  of  so  ordering  the  gainful 
occupations  and  the  thrift  in  town  and  country  that  means  [Vermdgen\ 
will  thereby  be  preserved,  increased,  and  reasonably  used,  and  the 

'  Apparently  used  in  this  paragraph  as  a  synonym  for  the  former 
term.   In  the  following  paragraph  this  is  certainly  the  case,  i.  e..  Prop.  243. 

»  Of  the  whole  following  division,  which  has  certain  necessary 
resemblances  to  political  economy  as  Adam  Smith  used  the  term,  yet 
differs  from  it  as  kitchen  work  from  chemistry,  we  may  say  that  it  con- 
tains nothing  beyond  commonplace  material  which  genius  and  humor 
like  Benjamin  Franklin's  might  have  coined  into  pithy  Poor  Richard's 
proverbs.  Sufficient  samples  are  given  to  show  the  quality.  It  should 
be  observed  that  the  presence  of  this  department  in  Staatswirthschaft 
again  demonstrates  the  absurdity  of  the  traditional  accounts  of  mer- 
cantilism as  a  theory. 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  367 

temporal  happiness  of  private  persons  will  be  promoted;  or  more 
briefly  expressed,  it  is  the  science  of  applying  our  **  means"  to  the  pro- 
motion of  our  temporal  happiness  (p.  437). 

244.  One  sense  of  "means"  [Vermdgen]  signifies  everything 
that  is  within  our  power,  or  that  which  we  are  able  to  bring  to  pass. 
In  ordinary  thinking  "means"  signifies  all  goods  and  aptitudes 
which  we  possess  and  which  we  may  employ  in  order  to  provide  for 
ourselves  the  necessities  and  conveniences  of  this  life.  In  the 
narrower  sense  we  understand  by  "means"  the  possession  of  a 
sufficiency  of  movable  or  immovable  goods,  which  put  in  our  hands, 
according  to  our  social  position  and  make-up  [Beschaffenheit],  all 
the  conveniences  and  advantages  of  life.  When  we  here  use  the 
term  "means,"  it  is  in  the  two  last  senses,  principally  in  the  third 

(P-  438)-' 

245.  Except  through  accident,  no  obtaining  of  "means"  is 
possible  unless  our  aptitudes  and  already-possessed  goods  are  the 
beginning  and  ground  of  the  acquisition  (p.  439). 

246.  By  "goods"  we  understand  in  Hatishaltungskunst  only 
those  things  which  have  a  certain  value  and  use  for  the  need  and 
convenience  of  human  life,  and  which  at  a  certain  value  or  price 
can  be  transferred  to  others;  i.  e.,  things  that  have  a  money  value 
(p.  440). 

247.  Credit  is  to  a  certain  extent  to  be  reckoned  among  goods, 
for  it  can  be  used  as  the  ground  and  beginning  of  "means"  (p.  440). 

248.  By  "aptitudes"  we  understand  those  acquired  capabilities 
and  skills  by  which  we  may  be  useful  to  others  and  to  ourselves  in 
business  and  trades,  or  in  social  life  in  general  (p.  441). 

249.  All  "means"  must  be  gained  either  by  services  [Dienste], 
or  by  trades  [Gewerbe].  The  former  require  only  "aptitudes;"  the 
latter  require  "aptitudes"  and  goods  together  (p.  441) 

250.  Services  are  a  certain  compact  between  the  principal  and 
the  servant,  by  which  the  latter,  in  return  for  a  certain  salary  or 
compensation,  promises  to  apply  his  "aptitudes,"  in  certain  assigned 

'  This  paragraph  sufficiently  accounts  for  choice  of  the  vague  terni' 
"means"  instead  of  a  more  technical  term  as  a  rendering  for  Vermdgen. 
We  should  misinterpret  egregiously  if  we  smuggled  a  later  precise  and 
constant  concept  into  the  word.     Vide  pp.  76  and  250. 


368  THE  CAMERALISTS 

occupations,  for  the  benefit  of  the  principal.  These  services  are 
either  honorable  or  menial;  they  are  also  morally  legitimate  or 
illegitimate  (p.  443). 

251.  The  two  great  classes  of  gainful  occupations  are  (i)  those 
that  procure  livelihood  in  the  town;  (2)  those  that  procure  livelihood 
in  the  country  (p.  443). 

252.  From  services  or  trades  come  "earnings"  [Geunnnst]. 
This  is  the  advantage  which  accrues  to  us  from  a  thing  after  deduction 
of  our  applied  outlay  and  effort.  The  justification  of  earnings  must 
have  at  its  basis  the  revenue  which  the  other  can,  and  probably  will 
derive  from  the  thing,  for  we  are  surely  entitled  to  demand  that  the 
other  shall  allow  a  just  portion  of  the  return  to  accrue  to  us  which 
he  would  not  have  acquired  without  our  co-operation  (p.  444). 

253.  In  order  to  gain  "means,"  one  must  first  of  all  make  a 
fAzn  of  his  mode  of  life,  and  of  the  ways  by  which  he  is  to  acquire 
earnings.  In  this  {^an  account  must  be  taken  of  his  aptitudes 
and  goorls.  Most  men  make  the  mistake  of  making  no  i^an,  and  of 
seeking  their  fortune  in  a  merely  haphazard  way.  Still  others  fail 
because  they  draw  back  in  fear  from  every  obstacle  (p.  453). 

253A.  Before  all  things  we  must  so  apply  our  "aptitudes"  and 
our  goods  that  they  will  actually  pronK>te  our  purposes  (p.  455). 

354.  Further  it  is  necessary  to  know  all  the  details  involved  in 
the  success  of  our  plan  (p.  457). 

355.  This  knowledge  will  enable  us  to  choose  the  necessary 
means  for  carrying  out  our  plan  (p.  457). 

256.  It  is  further  necessary  to  combine  these  means  in  a  skilful 
way  (p.  458). 

257.  By  this  skilful  combination  of  "means"  it  is  often  possible 
that  one  may  at  the  same  time  accomplish  several  sorts  of  purpose, 
and  cam  in  several  ways  (p.  458). 

358.  But  one  will  not  acquire  "means,"  cither  by  service  or 
trade,  if  one  has  not  learned  to  save  (p.  460). 

359.  In  order  to  exerdsc  this  great  art  of  saving,  the  first  thing 
in  every  establishment  must  be  a  budget  or  correct  estimate  of  income 
and  outlay  (p.  461). 

260.  The  savings  must  then  be  used  further  to  increase  "means" 
(p.  464). 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  369 

361.  After  all,  the  increase  of  "means"  will  be  a  tedious  process 
unless  one  takes  some  reasonable  chances,  and  occasionally  exposes 
a  part  of  his  "means"  to  the  hazards  of  fortune  (p.  465). 

363.  Those  who  make  such  ventures  should  first  possess 
considerable  "means,"  so  that  they  could  lose  what  they  risk  without 
being  reduced  to  want  (p.  466). 

363.  Then  the  anticipated  gain  should  be  in  proportion  to  the 
danger  to  which  one  is  exposed  (p.  467). 

364.  The  reasonable  use  of  "means"  is  the  chief  purpose  of 
acquisition  and  of  Haushaltungskunst. 

365.  "Means"  contribute  not  a  little  to  the  end  of  a  social 
happy,  and  virtuous  life.  One  is  thereby  much  more  qualified  for 
service  to  the  community,  and  one  can  fulfil  the  duties  of  social  life 
in  a  much  higher  degree  than  those  who  have  no  means  (p.  471). 

366.  The  reasonable  use  of  means  depends  upon  three  chief 
rules:  (i)  The  "means"  must  be  so  used  that  the  substance  (sic) 
of  the  same  will  not  be  impaired  (p.  471);  (s)  one  must  apply  one's 
"means"  to  the  support  of  one's  life  and  to  the  promotion  of  one's 
temporal  happiness,  according  as  the  social  positi(m  and  constitution 
of  each  demand,  and  as  the  condition  of  one's  "means"  permits 
(p.  481);  (3)  besides  using  our  "means"  for  our  own  needs  and  the 
convenience  of  our  life,  we  must  devote  them  also  to  the  use  of  (mr 
needy  neighbor,  and  to  the  advantage  of  the  refmblic  (p.  485). 

ON  MANAGEMENT  IN  TOWNS 

367.  The  life  of  towns  has  the  most  intimate  connection  with 
human  society  and  with  the  constitution  of  the  republic.  The  towns 
both  form  the  bond  of  connecti(m  between  the  rural  sustaining  S3rstem 
and  the  whole  sustaining  system  of  the  country,  and  in  them  quite 
unique  occupations  are  pursued,  which  have  immediate  influence  on 
the  weal  of  the  state.  The  fundamental  rules  of  management  can 
be  applied  here  therefore  only  in  a  general  way,  because  otherwise 
it  would  be  necessary  to  discuss  each  particular  occupation.  In  the 
case  of  rural  management,  on  the  contrary,  diere  must  be  specific 
application  of  the  general  rules  (p>  490). 

a68.  A  town  is  a  combination  of  societies,  families,  and  stn^ 
peiaons,  who  live  in  a  guarded  [veru/akrten]  locality,  under  the  over- 


37°  THE  CAMERALISTS 

sight  and  direction  of  a  police  bureau,  or  other  persons  charged  with 
administration  of  the  police  system,  in  order  with  better  success  to 
maintain  the  operation  and  co-operation  of  those  gainful  pursuits 
which  are  immediately  demanded  both  for  the  needs  and  conveniences 
of  the  country  and  for  the  unification  of  the  whole  sustaining 
system.  The  protection  [Verwahrung]  is  the  essential  finding  mark 
of  the  town,  without  which  no  locality  can  be  called  a  town,  how- 
ever large  and  well  built  it  may  be  (p.  490).* 

269.  The  essential  difference  between  towns  depends  therefore 
on  the  fact  that  one  kind  must  be  guarded  by  art,  that  is,  by  walls 
and  ditches,  another  kind  by  nature,  that  is,  by  oceans,  seas,  rivers, 
and  inaccessible  mountains,  so  that  entrance  may  be  had  only  at 
certain  places  called  gates  or  portals  expressly  designated  for  that 
purpose.  Otherwise  the  requisite  police  arrangements  for  the  chief 
purpose  of  the  town  are  not  available  (p.  493). 

270.  Towns  must  accordingly  be  classified  in  various  ways: 
(i)  Into  (a)  commercial  towns;  {b)  manufacturing  towns;  (c) 
mining  and  salt  towns;  (d)  brewery  and  distillery  towns;  (e)  market 
towns;  or  (2)  into  (a)  residence  towns  (i.  e.,  of  the  court);  (b)  uni- 
versity towns;  (c)  fortified  towns;  (d)  border  towns,  etc.;  or  (3)  into 
(fl)  large;  (b)  medium;  (c)  small;  or  (4)  into  (a)  capitab;  (jb) 
provincial  towns  (p.  496). 

271.  At  bottom  there  are  two  principal  types  of  occupation  for 
towns;  first,  the  assembling  of  persons  capable  of  carrying  on  the 
various  pursuits;  second,  the  accumulation  of  all  sorts  of  wares  and 
goods,  and  to  this  end  all  their  establishments,  measures,  and  en- 
deavors must  be  directed  (p.  497). 

272.  Since  we  are  here  exclusively  concerned  with  the  economy 
of  private  persons  in  towns,  we  have  to  do  principally  with  two 
subjects,  viz.:  (i)  What  the  general  rules  of  management  have  to 
say  about  management  and  organization  of  the  sustaining  occupa- 
tions; (2)  how  management  itself,  without  reference  to  occupations 
in  the  town,  may  best  be  conducted  (p.  497).' 

« It  is  needless  to  comment  on  this  typically  cameralistic  inversion 
of  essence  and  accident. 

'  This  programme  results  only  in  slight  variations  upon  the  general- 
ities indicated  by  Props.  253-64.     Passing  to  treatment  of  occupations 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  371 

273.  Rural  management  is  a  complex  of  sustaining  occupations' 
to  the  end  that  through  agriculture  and  stock-raising  the  resources 
of  the  soil  may  be  best  used,  and  that  all  sorts  of  raw  wares  and 
materials  may  be  extracted  from  the  same  for  human  need  and 
convenience.  The  rural  sustaining  occupations  consequently 
differ  from  those  of  towns  principally  in  this:  in  the  former  the 
effort  is  to  produce  raw  wares  and  goods,  in  the  latter  men  are  chiefly 
engaged  in  transforming  the  raw  wares  and  materials.  While  this 
latter  purpose  requires  unified  societies  and  efforts,  with  police 
supervision,  the  former  can  be  carried  on  by  separate  families  either 
scattered  at  considerable  intervals,  or  living  in  village  groups"' 
(P-  523)- 

THE      THEORY      OF      THE      REASONABLE      USE      OF     THE     "  MEANS" 

[Vermogen]    of    the    state,    including    cameral    or 

FINANCIAL  SCIENCE  PROPER 

On  the  Reasonable  Use  of  State  Revenues  in  General 
On  the  second  title-page  of  the  second  part,  or  volume, 
the  clause  is  inserted,  "in  vfhich  cameral  science  proper  is 
treated."  It  is  not  our  present  afifair  to  debate  with  Justi  the 
insufficiency  of  his  economic  foundation,  nor  to  go  into  details 
about  the  overlapping  and  confusion  of  economic,  camera- 
listic,  and  police  problems  as  they  appear  in  his  system.'  We 
are  attempting  to  present  this  typical  cameralist  just  as  he 
was,  and  to  show  how  cameralism  as  a  so-called  science 
reflected  the  immaturities  and  prejudices  of  the  type  of  state 
in  which  it  was  developed.  We  come  now  to  a  portion  of  the 
system  in  which  actual  administration  had  worked  out  a 
technique  that  was  relatively  precise.     In  so  far  as  such  a 

which  are  not  necessarily  peculiar  to  towns,  Justi  lapses  into  extended 
pseudo-technical  discussion  of  brewing,  distilling,  vinting,  truck-garden- 
ing, and  milling  (pp.  505-17). 

'  Then  follows  an  academic  version  of  the  wisdom  that  every  farmer's 
boy  is  supposed  to  acquire  (pp.  526-606).  This  then  is  as  deep  as  Justi 
goes  into  the  theory  of  economics  on  the  side  of  production  proper. 

»  Vide  II,  63,  and  Prop.  219. 


372  THE  CAMERALISTS 

technique,  not  guaranteed  by  a  conclusive  economics,  can 
have  a  value  for  science,  it  is  the  most  important  part  of  Justi's 
system.  We  must  repeat,  however,  that  the  problem  of  cam- 
eralism was  not  yet  consciously  the  problem  of  modem 
economics,  and  still  less  the  problem  of  modem  sociology, 
viz. :  What  is  the  value  of  all  mediate  processes  for  the  trunk- 
line  process  of  promoting  the  evolution  of  persons?  The 
problem  of  cameralism  was  merely  the  ways  and  means  prob- 
lem of  the  quasi-absolutistic  governments  of  that  period,  viz. : 
the  quasi-absolutistic  type  of  state  being  given,  in  which,  in 
efifect,  the  state  is  the  government,  and  the  government  is 
the  prince,  how  may  the  resources  of  that  t}rpe  of  state  be  so 
managed  that  its  perpetual  motion  will  be  assured? 

We  shall  show  this  in  further  detail  by  continuing  the  series 
of  propositions  condensing  Justi's  argument. 

•  274.  To  recapitulate:  The  common  happiness,  the  ultimate 
purpose  of  all  republics,  for  attaining  and  realizing  which  the  supreme 
power  exists  in  states,  demands  that  the  care  and  endeavor  of  this 
sovereign  power  shall  be  directcl  chiefly  toward  two  great  activities, 
viz.:  first,  securing  and  increasing  the  "means"  of  the  state;  second, 
the  reascmable  and  wise  use  of  the  "means."  The  great  management 
of  the  state  consists  then  of  these  two  chief  employments.  Part  I 
having  been  devoted  to  the  former  of  these.  Part  II  will  deal  with 
the  latter  (II,  3). 

275.  The  "means"  of  the  state  consist  not  merely  in  all  sorts 
of  movable  and  ij^ovable  goods,  possessed  primarily  either  by  the 
subjects  or  by  the  state  itself;  but  rather  in  all  talents  and  skill  of  the 
persons  who  belong  to  the  republic.  Even  the  persons  themselves 
mxxSt  in  a  certain  sense  be  included,  and  the  general  use  of  these 
means  of  the  state  constitute  the  supreme  power.'  All  ordinances 
of  the  supreme  power  have  for  their  object  therefore  the  wise  use 
of  the  means  and  forces  of  the  state  for  the  realization  of  the  conunon 
happiness  (II,  s).» 

»  Vide  I,  19,  and  this  book,  pp.  76,  250,  367. 

*  This  proposition  is  typical  of  the  vagueness  of  undifferentiated 
cameralistic  ideas.     The  original  reads:  "AUe  Anordnungen  der  chtr- 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  373 

376.  In  the  widest  senae,  the  reasonable  use  of  the  "means" 
of  the  state  includes  all  the  rules  laid  down  in  Part  I.  In  the  special 
sense  we  tmderstand  by  the  reasonable  use  of  the  "means"  of  the 
state  the  wise  measures  of  the  ruler,  to  the  end  that  the  general 
"means"  of  the  state  may  be  made  to  yield  certain  revenues,  and 
constantly  available  resources,  without  impairing  the  "means," 
and  in  accordance  with  the  demands  which  from  time  to  time  the 
essential  needs  of  the  state  may  enforce  (II,  6).* 

sten  GewaU  kommen  also  darauf  an,  dass  sie  von  dem  Vermdgen  umd  den 
Krdften  des  Staates  tu  der  Bewirkung  der  gemeinscht^Uichen  GlUckselig- 
keit  einen  weisen  Gebrauch  machet."  I  attribute  the  thoroughly  non- 
committal force  in  this  connection  of  the  phrase  "kommen  darauf  an,"  to 
an  unreconciled  antithesis  of  ideas.  As  it  stands,  the  proposition  dis- 
tinctly means  neither,  "The  objective  goodness  or  badness  of  the  acts  cl 
a  government  is  to  be  decided  by  its  use,  etc.,"  nor,  "The  itUention  of  the 
government  is  to  use,  etc."  The  former  meaning  would  lead  to  a  corol- 
lary which  is  abhorrent  to  Justi  {vide  I,  47,  above,  pp.  335  ff.).  The 
latter  meaning  is  always  the  reserve  presumption  on  which  to  rest  the 
claim  of  the  government  to  unquestioning  submission.  Yet,  so  long  as 
the  latter  claim  maintained  its  orthodoxy,  it  was  by  smuggling  into  its 
assets  s(Hne  of  the  credit  which  the  former  proposition  would  establish, 
while  that  proposition  was  not  admitted  at  full  force.  In  other  words, 
the  stage  oA  thinking  represented  by  Justi  was  a  dodging  between  afl^m- 
ative  and  negative  answers  to  the  question.  Are  govenunents  absolute, 
and  so  unimpeachable,  or  are  they  fallible,  and  consequently  to  stand  or 
fall  on  the  merits  of  their  acts  as  determined  by  some  objective  standard  ? 
The  quasi-absolutism  which  Justi  represented  resorted,  when  hard 
pushed,  to  the  affirmative.  Cromwellism  and  the  French  Revolution, 
and  the  American  Declaration  of  Independence  vindicated  the  negative. 
We  shall  miss  the  full  meaning  of  this  treatise  and  of  cameralism  in 
general,  if  we  fail  to  keep  in  mind  that  they  were  straddles  on  this  funda- 
mental problem,  with  the  working  balance  toward  the  arbitrary  side 
(P-  S13) 

I  It  should  be  remembered,  that  this  discussion  is  in  terms  of  Ver- 
mdgen, not  cS.  Rtichthmm.  One  of  the  most  subtle  questions  in  future 
historical  criticism  of  the  literature  of  economics  will  to  a  large  extent 
turn  upon  the  fallacy  of  interchanging  the  two  concepts.  When  Adam 
Smith  founded  systematic  study  of  problems  of  tceaUh,  he  carefully 
ddunited  the  omcept    The  subsequent  confusions  in  English  thinking 


374  THE  CAMERALISTS 

297.  The  first  condition  of  reasonable  use  of  the  "means"  of 
the  state  is  adequate  knowledge  of  them  (II,  6).' 

298.  The  wise  ruler  has  a  conception  of  a  true  happiness  of 
the  subjects  and  of  the  state  constantly  before  his  eyes,  and  he  has  a 

were  not  quite  indentical  with  those  in  German  theory,  and  one  of  the 
reasons  for  the  differences  was  strictly  verbal.  I  am  not  prepared  to 
express  a  judgment  about  the  relative  importance  of  this  factor.  I  have 
not  collected  sufBcient  evidence  to  prove  that  much  of  the  confusion  in 
English  economic  theories  came  from  taking  over  arguments  expressed  in 
unwarranted  translations  of  German  terms.  I  am  convinced,  however, 
that  this  is  the  case.  It  is  enough  at  present  to  point  out  that  it  would 
shunt  us  on  to  a  side  track  if  we  should  render  Justi's  word  Vermdgen 
by  the  primarily  legal  term  "property,"  still  more  if  we  should  use  the 
more  restricted  economic  term  "wealth."  The  work  of  reducing  this 
and  similar  ambiguous  terms  to  constant  values  has  been  a  considerable 
part  of  the  difhculty  of  promoting  the  various  social  technologies  assem- 
bled as  "cameralism"  to  relative  distinctness  and  precision. 

The  idea  of  the  divine  foreordination  of  hereditary  sovereignty 
reappears  as  the  constant  motif  in  the  cameralistic  doctrines.  We  illus- 
trated this  in  its  most  dogmatic  form  in  the  case  of  Schroder  (above, 
pp.  137  ff.).  Thus  Justi  says:  "The  Eternal  Being  whose  Providence 
has  ap[>ointed  him  to  the  government  of  the  people  put  under  him  as 
subjects  will  hold  a  ruler  to  strict  accounting,  etc."  This  was  not 
merely  a  pious  phrasing  of  social  order.  It  was  literal  interpretation, 
and  it  carried  the  corollary  that  the  Almighty  alone,  not  the  people  of  a 
state,  had  the  right  to  call  the  ruler  to  account.  Justi  employs  formulas 
of  the  ruler's  responsibility  which  would  mean  to  a  twentieth-century 
man  almost  all  that  we  should  assert  about  the  responsibility  of  chief 
magistrates  (e.  g.,  II,  10);  but  we  must  always  construe  these  proposi- 
tions in  the  light  of  the  reserve  clauses  in  the  author's  mind.  These 
latter  virtually  nullify  those  phases  of  democracy  in  the  formulas  which 
a  twentieth-century  man  would  regard  as  crucial. 

'  Much  of  the  development  of  the  pro]X>sition  in  subsequent  sections 
has  already  appeared  in  substance  in  our  citations  from  Justi's  Preface 
and  Introduction,  and  need  not  be  repeated.  For  instance,  a  section 
(II,  13-15)  is  devoted  to  the  proposition  that  a  ruler  ought  not  to  use  the 
"means"  of  the  state  without  having  a  correct  estimate  of  them.  It 
amounts  only  to  a  more  pjedantic  way  of  reading  the  New  Testament 
moral:  "  What  king  going  to  make  war  against  another  king,  sitteth  not 
down  first  and  consulteth  whether  he  be  able,  etc." 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  375 

correct  judgment  of  the  relative  proportions  of  the  different  needs 
(II,  15;  vide  I,  66-69).' 

299.  The  wise  ruler  must  take  no  steps  for  the  welfare  of  the 
state  without  taking  care  that  "means"  enough  are  devoted  to  the 
purpose  to  insure  its  success  (II,  17). 

300.  For  the  purposes  of  the  state,  great  sums  must  be  expended. 
These  "means"  are  mostly  in  the  hands  of  private  persons.  The 
portions  necessary  for  the  purposes  of  the  state  must  be  obtained 
from  the  individuals  in  ways  which  will  not  impair  the  substance  of 
their  "means,"  i.  e.,  they  must  be  taken  from  earnings  [Gewinnste]. 
Enough,  however,  must  be  left  so  that  the  subjects  can  live  from 
their  earnings  (II,  8). 

301.  The  "means"  so  obtained  must  be  at  all  times  available 
in  the  form  of  money,  and  we  call  it  then  "the  readiest  means"  of 
the  state  (II,  20). » 

302.  This  "readiest  means"  of  the  state  is  the  great  subject- 
matter  of  cameral  or  finance  science  proper,  in  so  far  as  the  same  is 
regarded  as  a  subordinate  science  under  all  the  economic  and  cameral 
sciences  required  for  the  government  of  a  state.  All  measures  and 
transactions  of  cameral  science  have  to  do  merely  with  this  "readiest 
means,"  and  have  for  their  aim  either  the  systematic  raising  of  the 
same  or  wise  application  or  administration.  Otherwise  expressed, 
Cameral  or  finance  science  is  an  adequate  knowledge  and  facility 
[Erkenntniss  und  Geschicklichkeit]   in  those  transactions  whereby 

I  Although  the  proposition  is  supported  only  by  the  most  common- 
place generalities,  it  indicates,  along  with  stalwart  faith  (for  publication) 
in  the  virtues  of  paternalism,  a  rather  comprehensive  view  of  the  sorts 
of  interests  which  the  benevolent  despot  should  try  to  harmonize.  Inci- 
dentally, Justi  again  has  his  fling  at  the  relative  unimportance  of  the 
learned  class. 

»  Justi  has  evidently  used  the  term  "means"  now  in  a  special  sense, 
i.  e.,  the  reserve  plus  the  current  revenues  of  the  state.  Whether  this 
idea  is  more  cause  or  effect  of  the  general  mercantilist  position  it  would  be 
fruitless  to  inquire.  It  is  a  typical  case  of  fallacious  transition  from  a 
concept  defined  to  include  both  goods  and  persons,  to  a  concept  sym- 
bolized by  the  same  term,  Vermogen,  but  defined  to  mean  gold  and  silver 
coin. 


376  THE  CAMERALISTS 

"the  readiest  means**  of  the  state,  for  promotion  of  the  common  happi- 
ness of  the  same,  are  well  and  economically  managed  (II,  21). 

303.  We  easily  see  that  cameral  science  is  closely  connected 
with  all  other  economic  sciences  which  are  treated  in  this  book. 
It  teaches  not  merely  how  to  use  wisely  and  for  the  good  of  the  state 
those  "means"  of  the  republic  which  are  founded,  preserved,  and 
increased  by  Staatskunst,  Policey,  die  Commercienwissenschaft  und 
Oekonomie,^  but  in  the  great  management  of  the  state  it  conducts,  so 
to  speak,  the  internal  management,  to  the  effect  that  without  its 
co-working  no  governmental  business  of  any  kind  can  be  undertaken; 
because  for  all  such  undertakings  "readiest  means"  are  necessary. 
In  short,  cameral  science  is  absolutely  indispensable  to  the  happiness 
of  the  state,  because  the  greatest  "means"  of  the  state  would  yield 
nothing,  without  skilful  administration.  Hence  it  has  its  ground  in 
the  common  fundamental  principle  of  all  the  sciences  which  pertain 
to  the  government  and  general  management  of  the  state.'  It  is 
particularly  based  however  on  die  Staatskunst  und  Policeywissen- 
schaft,  since  it  must  derive  its  chief  working  principles  from  them. 
Moreover  it  must  make  use  of  Haushaltungskunst  and  jurisprudence 
as  principal  auxiliaries.  The  former  will  furnish  the  elementary 
rules  of  managing  "means,"  the  latter  will  guard  against  unjust 
procedure  (II,  23). 

304.  The  fundamental  principle  of  cameral  science  is  this:  "In 
all  transactions  with  the  'readiest  means*  of  the  state,  the  aim  must 
he  to  seek  the  common  happiness  of  the  ruler  and  the  subjects** 

(II,  24).^ 

305.  The  rules  of  raising  the  revenues  without  harm  to  the 

•  As  we  have  seen,  these  are  categories  which  do  not  corresp)ond 
with  recognized  classifications  in  current  social  science.  The  essential 
reason  is  that  they  were  impossible  as  scientific  categories.  At  a  venture 
we  may  ofiFer  as  equivalents  the  terms,  civic  policy,  police  and  commer- 
cial science,  and  economy. 

»  Vide  above,  pp.  298  ff. 

3  In  spite  of  the  arbitrary  conception  of  the  state  in  terms  of  which 
this  formula  must  be  interpreted,  it  contains  much  saving  grace  of 
correct  moral  valuation,  while  the  context  shows  that  the  principle  was 
not  always  evident  in  actual  cameralistic  practices. 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  377 

subjects,  and  from  current  earnings,  must  also  be  applied  to  prov- 
inces, so  that  the  chief  division  of  the  state  will  not  be  favored  at 
the  expense  of  minor  divisions  (II,  30).' 

306.  The  theory  of  cameral  science  may  be  divided  into  three 
chief  parts.  We  accordingly  divide  this  second  part  of  the  Staats- 
wirthschaft  into  three  books:  (i)  On  the  raising  of  revenues;  (2) 
on  the  disbursements  of  the  state;  (3)  on  the  organization  and  admin- 
istration of  cameral  business.  This  classification  leaves  nothing 
lacking  which  is  necessary  for  a  beginner  in  cameral  or  finance 
science,  and  in  general  about  the  reasonable  use  of  the  "means" 
of  the  state  (II,  39). 

ON  COVERING   THE   COSTS  OP  THE  GREAT   OUTLAYS  OF  THE    STATE 

307.  A  state  often  finds  itself  in  need  of  resources  which  are  not 
supplied  by  the  rules  already  given  for  raising  the  "readiest  means." 
This  book  is  devoted  then  to  the  problems  which  those  extraordinary 
requirements  involve  (II,  40). 

308.  The  problems  of  cameralism  accordingly  fall  into  three 
chief  divisions:  (i)  The  establishment  of  the  "readiest  means" — 
which  calls  for  the  greatest  skill  and  strength  of  the  cameralist; 
(2)  the  raising  of  the  regular  income  of  the  state  from  the  sources 
that  are  common  to  almost  all  states;  (3)  the  raising  of  emergency 
funds  (II,  42).' 

309.  Establishing  the  "readiest  means"  of  the  state  depends 

»  in  this  connection  (II,  33)  Justi  admits  that  he  is  repeating  rules 
that  have  already  been  laid  down,  but  he  solemnly  adds,  "  But  in  those 
passages  we  were  not  yet  treating  cameral  science  proper.  Since  it  is 
now  necessary  particularly  to  define  the  fundamental  principles  of  this 
science,  we  must  not  be  content  with  mere  citation  of  the  fundamental 
principles  reviewed  above.  Indeed  these  are  not  the  same,  since  in  the 
former  case  we  were  talking  of  the  use  of  the  general  "means"  of  the 
state,  while  now  we  are  speaking  of  the  administration  of  the  revenues 
of  the  state.  Nevertheless,  everything  that  could  be  called  a  "  principle  " 
is  the  same,  even  in  Justi's  version,  and  he  was  close  to  the  perception 
that  cameralistics  was  not  a  science  at  all,  but  merely  a  technology  without 
a  peculiar  scientific  content. 

»  From  this  point  the  treatment  becomes  more  narrowly  technical. 
To  what  extent  it  was  practical  rather  than  academic,  according  to 


378  THE  CAMERALISTS 

first  upon  developing  a  populous  land,  with  the  maximum  amount 
of  wealth  circulating  in  the  gainful  occupations  (II,  44). 

310.  A  second  and  more  immediate  foundation  is  necessary, 
viz.,  either  certain  estates  the  proprietorship  of  which  belongs 
immediately  to  the  state  and  to  the  ruler,  and  the  whole  revenue  of 
which  accrues  to  the  "readiest  means,"  or  certain  rights  reserved  to 
the  supreme  power.    The  proper  name  of  these  rights  is  the  regalia 

(11,  45). 

311.  The  foundation  of  the  revenues  of  the  state  is  laid  then, 
first,  in  good  management  of  the  estates  immediately  appertaining 
to  the  state  or  to  the  ruler  (II,  45). 

312.  In  the  case  of  the  regalia,  the  desideratum  is  a  reasonable 
use  of  the  rights,  in  consideration  of  the  common  "means"  of  the 
state,  and  of  the  common  welfare  of  the  ruler  and  of  the  subjects 
(II,  46).' 

313.  The  best  standard  of  taxation  is  the  persons  of  the  subjects 
in  general,  according  to  a  just  proportion  of  their  immovable 
"means"  and  industry,  and  especially  the  laborers  and  assistants 
employed  in  such  gainful  occupations.  In  such  case  the  commerce, 
the  industry,  and  the  freedom  of  the  subjects  would  not  suffer  the 
slightest  hindrance,  as  the  number  of  the  persons  employed  could 
not  possibly  be  concealed  (II,  52). 

314.  It  is  possible  for  the  state  to  raise  so  little  revenue  by 
taxation  that  the  total  "means"  of  the  state  will  fall  far  below  the 
normal  level,  and  the  welfare  of  the  subjects  will  be  harmfully 
restricted  (II,  53). 

contemporary  standards,  it  docs  not  fall  within  my  province  to  decide. 
The  technical  programme  proposed  has  diminishing  pertinence  to  the 
purposes  of  this  book.  I  shall  accordingly  ignore  the  larger  part  of  its 
contents,  and,  as  in  the  account  of  Adam  Smith's  purely  economic  chapters 
(vide  Small,  Adam  Smith  and  Modern  Sociology),  merely  call  attention 
to  incidental  symptoms. 

»  While  our  aim  does  not  permit  attention  to  details  of  fiscal  tech- 
nology, it  should  be  noted  that  for  investigators  of  the  subject  of  taxation,' 
the  rule-of-thumb  conclusions  scheduled  by  Justi  are  by  no  means 
unworthy  of  consideration.  For  example,  Justi's  rules  are  quite  close 
approaches  to  the  doctrines  of  free  trade  afterward  promulgated  by 
Adam  Smith  (e.  g.,  II,  48,  49). 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  379 

315.  The  Regalia  should  be  so  administered  that  the  welfare 
of  the  state  and  the  convenience  of  the  subjects  would  remain  the 
first  consideration,  and  the  revenues  the  second  (II,  54). 

316.  A  reasonable  cameralist  will  accordingly  follow  two  rules: 
(i)  Direct  management  by  the  administration  of  complicated 
economic  processes  must  be  avoided  by  arranging  with  competent 
Entrepreneurs  (sic)  to  carry  on  the  enterprises  at  their  own  risk, 
at  a  certain  rate  of  dividend  on  the  proceeds;  (2)  all  needless  extra 
expense,  such  as  unnecessary  employees,  must  be  avoided  (II,  56).' 

317.  Subsidies  from  foreign  rulers  are  not  to  be  rejected,  especi- 
ally if  they  do  not  entail  more  costs  than  they  amount  to  (II,  61-63). 

318.  The  best  and  surest  increase  of  the  revenues  of  the  state 
comes  from  encouraging  the  laboring  class  [Nahrungsstand] 
(11,  63). 

319.  A  cameralist  should  at  the  same  time  be  a  police  expert 
and  an  economist  (II,  63). 

320.  The  first  care  of  the  cameralist  must  be  for  the  develop- 
ment and  cultivation  of  unimproved  and  thinly  populated  sections 
(II,  64). 

321.  A  considerable  budget  must  therefore  be  annually  at  the 
disposal  of  the  bureaus  (II,  66). 

322.  Even  without  such  capital  the  domains  may  by  good 
management  be  made  to  yield  large  revenues  (II,  69-74). 

323.  Returning  to  the  Regalia — the  most  harmless  increase  of 
revenues  through  extended  use  of  the  Regalia  occurs  (i)  when  they 
are  used  in  places  where  they  had  previously  not  been  enforced. 
Hence  the  intelligent  cameralist  must  be  on  the  watch  for  such 
undeveloped  sources  of  revenue  (II,  75);  (2)  through  improvements 
of  public  works  affected  by  the  Regalia  (II,  76) ;  (3)  through  increase 
of  the  rate  of  impost  and  of  prices  of  products  covered  by  the  Regalia 

(11.  77). 

324.  The  problem  of  increasing  the  revenues  of  the  state  in  the 
form  of  contributions,  taxes,  and  other  payments  by  the  subject  can 
be  solved  only  by  improving  the  condition  of  the  laboring  class,  and 

I  A  highly  idealistic  excursus  follows  on  the  possibility  of  painless 
taxation.  Justi  declares  that  democracies  might  easily  rea4ize  such  an 
ideal  (II,  57). 


380  THE  CAMERALISTS 

by  increasing  the  population  (II,  81),  but  this  just  portion  of  revenue 
should  be  collected  only  when  the  needs  of  the  state  call  for  it. 

325.  The  only  exception  is  when  a  new  impost  may  restrain 
or  cure  a  police  evil,  or  may  evidently  benefit  and  enlarge  the  laboring 
class.' 

336.  The  second  chief  responsibility  of  the  cameralist  is  the 
raising  of  the  ordinary  revenues  of  the  state.*  By  the  ordinary 
revenues  we  understand  the  established  arrangements  for  covering 
the  ordinary  needs  of  the  state  by  levies  upon  designated  objects 
(II,  88). 

327.  Following  the  Roman  law,  it  has  been  customary  in 
Germany  to  distinguish  between  Fiscutn  and  Aerarium.  Under  the 
former  are  classed  the  revenues  of  the  cameral  estates  and  of  the 
Regalia.  These  are  supposed  to  be  for  the  support  of  the  person  of 
the  ruler  and  of  his  family,  court,  and  servants,  with  all  other  expenses 
necessary  to  maintain  the  princely  dignity.  It  is  the  traditional 
idea  that  the  cameralists  were  to  deal  especially  with  these  revenues, 
and  they  are  accordingly  known  as  cameral  revenues.  The  reve- 
nues of  the  Aerarium  are  supposed  to  be  especially  for  the  protec- 
tion and  security  of  the  country,  and  for  promoting  the  general 
welfare  of  the  state  (II,  89). 

328.  This  distinction  is  groundless  (II,  90). 

329.  Knowledge  of  the  distinction  is  necessary,  however,  in 
order  to  understand  certain  existing  survivals  and  consequences  of 
the  distinction  in  the  present  cameral  organization  (II,  92). 

330.  It  is  best  to  divide  the  revenues  of  the  state  according  to 
their  four  chief  sources,  viz.:  (i)  Those  from  the  crown  estates, 
the  cameral  estates,  or  the  domains  (as  they  are  variously  named) ; 
(2)  those  from  the  Regalia;  (3)  those  from  payments  by  the  sub- 
jects, in  general  taxation;  (4)  those  which  indirectly  accrue  in  the 
course  of  attaining  other  chief  purposes  (II,  95).^ 

>  Justi's  examples  would  fall  in  the  class  of  sumptuary  laws. 
»  Vide  Prop.  208. 

3  The  sections  devoted  in  turn  to  these  subjects  contain  almost 
nothing  pertinent  to  our  purpose.  They  are  strictly  technological 
(II,  97-305)- 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  381 

OF  CONTRIBUTIONS,  TAXES,  AND  IMPOSTS 

This  portion  of  the  Staatswirthschqft  is  also  chiefly  tech- 
nological, and  thus  not  primarily  germane  to  our  purpose. 
Since  policies  of  taxation  have  their  roots,  however,  so  deep 
in  social  philosophy,  and  since  the  theories  of  taxation  occupy 
so  prominent  places  in  the  social  sciences,  we  present  a  digest 
of  Justi's  more  general  opinions. 

331.  The  three  chief  sources  of  the  necessary  income  of  the 
state  are:  (i)  the  contributions;  (2)  the  taxes;  (3)  the  excises  paid 
by  the  subjects.  The  domains  and  the  Regalia  are  not  sufficient 
to  cover  the  expenses  necessary  for  the  welfare  of  the  state,  especially 
in  the  present  armed  condition  of  Europe.  The  magnificence  of 
courts  has  also  greatly  increased.  To  cover  these  costs  the  subjects 
must  contribute  from  their  private  means  (II,  306). 

33a.  There  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  subjects  owe  this  con- 
tribution to  the  great  expenses  of  the  state.  In  so  far  as  all  subjects, 
in  respect  to  their  common  welfare,  are  in  close  unity  with  one 
another,  and  represent  a  single  body,  or  moral  person,  their  private 
means  are  at  the  same  time  the  general,  although  mediate  "means" 
of  the  state  (II,  307+  vide  I,  415,  Prop.  239). 

333.  It  is  a  fundamental  rule  to  seek  such  ways  and  means  of 
levying  the  taxes  now  in  mind,  that  the  subjects  will  pay  them  with 
willing  and  happy  hearts,  and  at  their  own  initiative.  This  is 
possible  even  in  monarchies,  if  wise  use  is  made  of  the  passions  of 
the  subjects;  e.  g.,  if  the  people,  with  the  exception  of  nobility  and 
scholars,  are  divided  into  classes,  according  to  the  amount  of  tax 
which  they  pay;  or,  if  certain  lucrative  occupations  are  permitted 
only  to  persons  who  pay  a  certain  minimum  tax,  as  is  stipulated  for 
example  in*  the  case  of  brewers  in  Frankenhausen,  Schwarzburg, 
etc.  (II,  309). 

334.  A  second  fundamental  rule  is  that  the  taxes  must  not 
interfere  with  the  reasonable  freedom  of  human  conduct,  with  th« 
credit  of  merchants,  with  the  trades,  and  shall  in  general  not  be 
oppressive  to  the  industrial  system  or  to  commerce  (II,  311). 

335.  A  third  rule  is  that  the  taxes  must  be  levied  upon  all 
subjects  with  righteous  equality,  since  all  are  equally  under  obliga- 


382  THE  CAMERALISTS 

tion  in  this  connection,  and  all  share  in  the  protection  and  other 
benelits  of  the  state.  Yet  the  application  of  this  rule  must  have  due 
respect  to  the  second,  for,  although  all  subjects  should  pay  taxes 
in  just  proportion  to  their  means,  yet  the  nature  and  purpose  of  the 
different  species  of  goods  does  not  permit  that  all  objects  can  bear 
equal  rates  of  taxation  (II,  312). 

336.  A  fourth  rule  is,  that  the  contributions  and  excises  shall 
have  a  sure,  fixed,  and  unfalsified  ground,  and  consequently  should 
Ije  levied  upon  objects  not  only  upon  which  they  may  be  promptly 
and  certainly  collected,  but  in  connection  with  which  fraud  and  con- 
cealment is  not  easy  for  the  subjects,  nor  peculation  for  the  officials 

(11,  313)- 

337.  A  fifth  rule  is,  that  the  taxes  shall  be  based  on  such  objects 
as  will  permit  limitation  of  the  number  of  collectors'  offices,  and 
therewith  of  officials  (II,  314). 

338.  The  sixth  and  last  fundamental  rule  is  that  payments 
must  be  made  as  easy  as  possible  for  the  subjects,  and  hence  must 
be  divided  into  convenient  parts,  and  made  payable  at  appropriate 
times  (II,  315).' 

339.  It  is  not  easy  to  hit  upon  an  impost  which  satisfies  all  these 
requirements.  Vauban,  Schroder,  and  others  have  proposed  a 
royal  or  general  tithe,  which  should  combine  all  desirable  qualities. 
Tested  by  above  rules,  however,  the  plan  will  be  found  wanting. 
Others  have  proposed  a  combined  poll  and  income  tax,  etc.  (II,  316). 

340.  The  nearest  approach  to  application  of  the  rules  will  be 
through  selecting  three  classes  of  objects  for  taxation,  viz.:  first, 
immovable  goods;  second,  the  persons  of  the  subjects;  third,  the 
gainful  occupations  (II,  318). 

>  Vvle  Adam  Smith's  "four  maxims,"  Wealth  of  Nations,  Book  V, 
cap.  ii,  part  ii,  Bax  cfl.,  p.  351.  Vide  Small,  Adam  Smith  and  Modern 
Sociology,  pp.  229  fT.  Smith's  first  maxim  is  approximately  Justi's 
third  rule;  the  second  maxim  is  nearly  Justi's  fourth  rule;  the  third 
maxim  is  almost  identical  with  Justi's  sixth  rule;  the  fourth  maxim  may 
])C  tom[)arcd  with  Justi's  second  rule,  but  is  much  more  fundamental 
and  prc(  isc.  Justi's  Rule  i  is  nebulous;  Rule  5  refers  to  one  class  of 
consideration  only  which,  with  many  others,  enforces  the  much  wider 
generalization  of  Smith's  Maxim  4. 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  383 

OF  CONTRIBUTIONS  AND  TAXES  ON  IMMOVABLE  GOODS 

341.  The  propriety  of  taxing  land  rests  on  two  facts:  first,  it 
is  mediately  a  part  of  the  general  property  of  the  state;  second,  the 
revenues  from  it  are  least  concealable.  Nor  is  there  any  hardship 
in  liability  of  the  land  for  a  portion  of  the  expenses  of  the  state 
(II,  320).' 

342.  Lands  of  the  different  kinds,  e.  g.,  meadows,  vineyards, 
forests,  etc.,  must  be  divided  into  three  classes,  good,  medium,  and 
bad;  and  houses  must  also  be  classified  as  large,  medium,  and  small. 
Again,  the  regions  in  which  the  lands  lie  must  also  be  classified,  and 
in  like  manner  the  towns  which  contain  the  houses.  A  calculus  of 
these  different  factors  will  give  the  rate  of  taxation  (II,  324). 

343.  The  productiveness  of  the  land  must  be  precisely  reck- 
oned, and  the  tax  must  be  levied  accordingly  (II,  324).* 

344.  The  revenues  of  the  houses  should  also  determine  the 
amount  of  levy  upon  them;  and  it  should  correspond  with  the  just 
rate  upon  the  interest  which  would  be  derived  from  the  selling  value 
of  the  same  (II,  325). 

345.  An  important  duty  of  the  bureaus  relates  to  remission  of 
the  taxes  in  case  of  providential  losses  by  fire,  flood,  storm,  drought, 
etc.  (II,  333). 

346.  It  is  a  mistake  for  the  ruler  to  reward  services  by  grants  of 
freedom  from  taxation  (II,  335). 

OF  PERSONAL  TAXATION 

347.  The  second  chief  taxable  object  is  the  person  of  the  sub- 
jects themselves.  Not  all  subjects  possess  immovable  goods.  All 
are  however  members  of  the  community,  and  enjoy  its  benefits;  all 
consequently  owe  something  in  return.  Personal  payments  to  the 
state  even  by  those  who  also  pay  land  taxes  are  therefore  proper,  if 
they  are  rightly  graded  (II,  340). 

348.  The  personal  tax  may  be  the  chief  tax  of  a  country,  virtually 

'  The  details  which  follow  deal  with  the  technique  of  assessing  and 
collecting  land  taxes. 

«  It  is  not  clear  whether  Justi  regards  this  precept  as  a  further 
elaboration  of  342,  or  as  something  distinct.  There  is  no  meaning  in  the 
classification  proposed  in  343,  unless  it  is  a  part  of  the  process  intended 
by  343- 


384  THE  CAMERALISTS 

summing  up  all  the  fonns  of  income  tax,  or  it  may  be  an  accessory  of 
the  principal  forms  of  taxation  (II,  341). 

349.  There    is    no    adequate   standard   of  personal   taxation 

(11,  343)- 

350.  Personal  taxes  may  be  regarded  as  a  means  of  collecting 
a  portion  of  their  dues  to  the  state  from  subjects  who  otherwise 
would  be  wholly  or  partially  exempt  from  taxation  (II,  344). 

351.  Poll  taxes  on  Jews  are  to  be  specified  as  one  of  the  forms 
of  personal  tax.  They  are  levied  at  the  same  rate  upon  rich  and 
poor  alike,  and  they  are  left  to  equalize  the  matter  among  themselves. 
Usually  the  whole  Jewish  community  is  held  responsible  for  pay- 
ment of  an  aggregate  sum  reckoned  in  proportion  to  the  numbers. 
Since  it  is  the  choice  of  this  unfortunate  race  to  remain  aliens  among 
us,  we  need  not  bother  ourselves  about  strict  propriety  and  exact 
justice  (II,  346). 

352.  In  some  countries  protection-money  [Schutzgdd]  is  paid 
by  those  subjects,  or  aliens,  who  possess  no  immovable  goods. 
It  is  sometimes  reckoned  by  families,  sometimes  by  polls.  In  either 
case  it  is  to  be  reckoned  as  a  personal  tax.  This  is  an  undesirable 
levy  in  addition  to  a  poll  tax  (II,  347).* 

353.  Various  other  taxes  have  been  levied  as  personal,  .which 
are  really  occupation  taxes  or  excise  (II,  348). 

354.  In  the  same  way,  salt  and  tobacco  taxes  have  been  levied 
as  personal  taxes  (II,  348). 

355.  The  chief  duties  of  the  cameralists  in  connection  with  these 
personal  taxes  consist  in  so  administering  the  same  that  the  system 
will  be  reasonable,  conducive  to  the  welfare  both  of  the  subjects  and 
of  the  state,  and  duly  respective  of  the  equality  of  the  subjects.  In 
this  respect  a  cameralist  has  an  opportunity  to  show  great  skill  and 
wisdom.  Decisions  must  be  rendered  as  to  cases  in  which  peisonal 
taxes  should  be  remitted.  The  ground  for  this  concession  should  be 
services.*    Particulariy  must  the  cameralists  take  care  that  personal 

'  Justi  makes  the  Schuttgeld  appear  as  a  species  of  the  genus  now 
known  as  "police  graft." 

•Justi  broadly  hints  that  "the  benefit  of  clergy"  had  German 
forms  which  amounted  to  serious  abuses,  e.  g.,  in  freeing  from  personal 
taxation  as  "GeUhrte,"  men  who  had  made  no  good  use  of  their  time  in 
the  university. 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  385 

and  other  taxes  are  collected  by  the  same  officials,  so  that  the  expense 
of  separate  employees  shall  be  saved  (II,  351). 

OF  TAXES  ON  OCCUPATIONS,  OR  SO-CALLED  EXCISE  AND  IMPOSTS 

356.  Since  immovable  goods  can  be  burdened  with  taxes  to 
the  extent  of  only  one-fourth  or  one-third  of  their  earnings,  and  since 
no  very  considerable  sum  can  be  raised  from  personal  taxation,  the 
gainful  occupations  must  be  the  next  source  of  revenue  (II,  352). 

357.  Occupations  may  be  taxed  (a)  on  the  materials  which 
they  use,  and  on  their  output  (excise);  or  (b)  directly,  according 
to  the  extent  of  their  operations  (II,  353). 

358.  The  former  method  is  almost  universal  in  Europe  (II,  353). 

359.  The  latter  has  a  minor  place  (II,  353). 

360.  Various  causes  contribute  to  the  vogue  of  excises  in 
Germany:  thus  (a)  the  limitation  of  tariffs  by  the  laws  of  the  Empire 
gave  occasion  for  excises  as  the  most  convenient  and  productive 
substitute.  Again  (&)  it  was  observed  that  large  industries  were 
growing  up  in  the  towns  without  paying  much  into  the  national 
treasury;  (c)  they  are  means  of  getting  revenue  from  individuals 
who  have  no  immovable  goods  (II,  355). 

361.  It  is  not  true  that  the  owners  of  real  estate  can  make  the 
taxes  which  they  pay  fall  upon  other  subjects,  because  customary 
price  defeats  this  shifting  of  the  incidence  of  the  tax  (II,  355). 

362.  A  further  reason  for  the  use  of  excise  is  that  it  gives  the 
ruler  a  much  freer  hand  than  in  levying  land  taxes  (II,  356). 

363.  Excise  is  either  universal — falling  upon  all  articles  without 
exception  which  are  used  for  the  support  of  life  or  come  into  the 
channels  of  trade;  or  particular — falling  upon  selected  articles  of 
consumption  or  wares  (II,  356). 

364.  Excise  does  not  conform  to  the  rules  above  given  for 
taxation;  for  (i)  it  limits  the  reasonable  freedom  of  human  action 
(II,  358);   (2)  it  is  detrimental  to  crafts  and  commerce  (II,  359); 

(3)  it  does  not  spread  the  burden  of  taxation  equally  (II,  361); 

(4)  it  has  no  secure  basis,  since  fraud  and  peculation  are  afforded 
large  scope  (II,  362);  (5)  its  collection  requires  many  officials  and 
large  expense  (II,  364). 

365.  The  claims  for  excise  are  insufficient;   viz.:    (i)  It  puts  a 


386  THE  CAMERALISTS 

share  of  the  common  burdens  upon  all;  (2)  by  limiting  his  expendi- 
tures each  may  ease  the  burden  at  will;  (3)  it  calls  for  only  a 
fraction  of  earnings  a  little  at  a  time;  (4)  but  almost  without  the 
knowledge  of  the  subjects  it  increases  the  "readiest  means"  of  the 
state;  (5)  no  sheriffs'  process  (execution)  is  required  to  enforce  it; 
(6)  aliens  must  bear  their  share;  (7)  it  is  a  means  of  controlling  the 
commerce  of  the  country,  and  of  promoting  manufactures  (II,  365). 

366.  Since  immediate  aboUtion  of  excise  is  hojseless,  the  rules 
for  its  employment  must  be  stated,  viz.:  (i)  All  the  rules  previously 
laid  down  in  the  case  of  tariffs,  etc.  (II,  288-300);  (2)  excise  rates 
must  respect  the  rate  of  earnings  of  the  different  occupations,  and 
must  call  for  only  a  small  fraction  of  the  earnings  of  those  that  deal 
in  the  necessities  of  Ufe  (II,  368);  (3)  in  order  that  moderation  of 
excise  be  not  misused  for  unwarranted  increase  of  profits,  the  police 
must  interfere  and  fix  the  price  of  necessities  (II,  369);  (4)  larger 
demands  may  be  made  upon  luxuries  (II,  369);  (5)  but  the  three 
grades  of  luxury  must  be  respected  (II,  369;  vide  I,  231);  (6)  excise 
is  surely  excessive  when  it  amounts  to  more  than  the  remaining 
earnings  of  the  craft,  or  when  it  amounts  to  a  half  or  two-thirds  of 
an  article  on  sale  (II,  369) ;  (7)  excise  must  vary  according  as  the 
transactions  are  first,  second,  or  third  hand,  and  whether  a  craft 
contributes  or  not  to  the  completion  or  improvement  of  a  thing 
(11,  370). 

367.  Occupation-taxes  [Gewerbe-Steuer]  might  be  introduced, 
in  harmony  with  the  fundamental  rules  of  taxation,  and  to  the 
advantage  both  of  ruler  and  subject  (II,  373). 

368.  The  essential  principle  of  this  type  of  tax  is  adjustment 
to  the  scale  of  income  of  the  occupation  (II,  374-92).' 

OF  THE  RIGHT  OF  THE  SOVEREIGN  TO  IMPOSE  SPECIAL  TAXES 

369.  These  revenues  may  be  called  accidental  in  a  double  sense: 
First  the  sovereign  power  finds  occasion  to  raise  certain  revenues 
without  making  the  revenues  themselves  the  ultimate  purpose,  and 
at  the  same  time  without  prejudice  to  the  actual  ultimate  purpose  of 
the  state;  second,  these  revenues  may  be  called  accidental  because 

•  Justi.  elaborates  a  scheme  of  occupation  taxes  in  considerable 
detail,  and  seems  to  regard  it  as  wholly  practicable  and  wise. 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  387 

they  are  based  merely  on  accidental  arrangements  and  certain 
incidents,  either  of  the  whole  republic  or  of  the  supreme  power;  or 
of  those  subjects  who  contribute  to  these  revenues.  Such  occasional 
circumstances  are  so  various  that  some  of  them  are  likely  to  be 
present  always,  and  their  revenues  consequently  aggregate  an 
appreciable  sum  (II,  400). 

370.  These  accidents  may  be  grouped  in  five  classes,  and  we 
may  arrange  |liem  in  the  order  of  their  probable  value  in  yielding 
revenue,  viz.:  (i)  Revenues  from  overlordship  of  the  state  over 
certain  properties,  to  be  distinguished  from  the  Regalia  (II,  401-11); 
(2)  rights  of  revenue  that  are  incidents  of  the  administration  of 
justice  (II,  412-16);  (3)  the  revenues  accruing  through  administra- 
tion of  the  police  system  (II,  417-21);  (4)  revenues  incidental  to  the 
war-making  power,  including  subsidies  (II,  422-25);  (5)  revenues 
from  sovereignty  over  the  ecclesiastical  system  (II,  426-29).' 

ON  THE  COLLECTING  OF  EXTRAORDINARY  SUMS  FOR  THE 
USE   OF  THE  STATE 

371.  In  case  of  war,  or  other  crises,  exceptional  demands  for 
money  arise.  It  is  not  for  the  cameralist  to  decide  whether  the 
occasion  actually  demands  the  exceptional  sums,  but  if  the  ruler  has 
so  decided  it  is  the  task  of  the  cameralist  to  find  the  ways  and  means. 
These  are  chiefly  two:  (i)  Extraordinary  contributions  of  the  sub- 
jects;  (2)  the  credit  of  the  ruler  and  of  the  country  (II,  430-33). 

372.  There  are  two  ways  of  levying  extraordinary  contributions, 
viz.:  (i)  By  increasing  the  rates  of  ordinary  contributions  and  taxes; 
(2)  by  levying  a  new  sort  of  contribution.  The  preference  is  to  be 
determined  by  the  circumstances  of  the  state.  If  the  sums  to  be 
raised  are  not  too  great,  if  there  is  no  need  of  instant  payment,  and 
if  the  ruler  can  assure  the  subjects  that  the  increase  will  be  only 
temporary,  the  former  method  is  preferable,  because  the  technique 
for  raising  such  contributions  is  already  in  operation.  The  existing 
taxes  must,  however,  be  at  such  rates  that  they  do  not  absorb  one- 
third  of  earnings,  or  the  other  form  must  be  adopted  (II,  435). 

I  These  items  as  treated  by  Justi  are  so  largely  reflections  of  tem- 
porary conditions,  that  the  details  yield  nothing  for  our  purpose  that 
has  not  appeared  elsewhere. 


388  THE  CAMERALISTS 

373.  The  best  form  of  extraordinary  levy  is  a  tax  on  social 
position  [Wurdensteuer],  that  is,  all  subjects,  lay  and  clerical,  are  to 
be  arranged  in  classes  and  subdivisions,  and  the  higher  the  social 
rank  and  dignity  the  higher  must  be  the  rate  of  this  tax.  Thus  the 
levy  falls  to  a  considerable  extent  upon  persons  who  were  not  bur- 
dened before,  and  who  have  the  ready  means  of  payment  (II,  443)' 

374.  One  of  the  first  rules  of  a  wise  government  must  be  to 
preserve  its  credit,  and  this  depends,  first,  on  integrity  in  its  trans- 
actions; second,  on  prompt  payment  of  interest  (II,  452). 

375.  The  establishment  of  a  bank  is  also  a  useful  means  of 
obtaining  control  of  extraordinary  sums  (II,  455). 

376.  Another  means  is  the  provision  of  annuities,  the  capital 
of  which  falls  to  the  state  on  the  death  of  the  annuitants  (II,  455). 

377.  So-called  ^'Tontines,"  invented  in  France,  and  named 
after  their  originator,  Tonti,  are  also  to  be  considered  (II,  456) 

378.  Lotteries  may  also  be  used  when  exceptional  sums  are 
needed  (II,  458). 

379.  Scruples  about  the  fundamental  morality  of  annuities, 
tontines,  and  lotteries  are  not  sufficiently  valid  to  estop  the  state  from 
Hsing  them  (II,  459). 

380.  Although  it  is  impossible  to  exclude  aliens  from  invest- 
ment in  annuities,  tontines,  and  other  forms  of  state  debts,  yet  so  far 
as«  possible  subjects  should  be  preferred  as  investors,  so  that  the 
interest  will  not  go  out  of  the  country.  Whether  money  should  be 
borrowed  abroad  for  the  sake  of  winning  other  nations  to  our  interest 
is  another  question  which  belongs  to  Staalskunst  (II,  461). 

381.  VVhen  the  credit  of  the  country  makes  borrowing  difficult, 
then  one  of  the  more  common  devices  is  to  farm  out  certain  fixed 
revenues,  and  to  obtain  advances  from  the  parties  to  whom  they  are 
farmed  (II,  461). 

382.  A  similar  device  is  to  make  over  certain  domains  or  other 
revenues  of  the  state  to  a  lender  (II,  462). 

383.  A  still  more  desperate  device  is  the  pawning  of  domains 
or  even  provinces  (II,  463). 

384.  A  cameralist  will  today  scarcely  recommend  the  absolute 
alienation  of  territories  and  people  for  the  sake  of  money  (II,  465). 

I  Additional  minor  taxes  are  discussed  (II,  445-49). 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  389 

OP  THE  EXPENSES  OF  THE  STATE 

385.  The  second  chief  responsibility  of  the  cameralist  is  with 
the  disbursements  of  the  state,  and  this  is  quite  as  important  as 
responsibility  for  the  revenues  (II,  469).* 

386.  Instead  of  being  expended  for  the  common  happiness,  the 
means  of  the  state  are  (i)  often  wasted;  (2)  used  with  shortsighted 
niggardliness;  (3)  applied  at  the  wrong  point  for  the  best  results; 
(4)  unsystematically  administered  (II,  471). 

387.  In  order  to  avoid  these  errors,  the  rules  laid  down  in  the 
introduction  must  be  applied,  viz. :  (i)  Outlays  must  be  in  accordance 
with  the  circumstances  and  revenues  of  the  state;  (2)  the  "readiest 
means"  of  the  state  must  be  used  for  no  other  purpose  than  the  best 
good  of  ruler  and  subjects  (II,  473). 

388.  From  the  previous  fundamental  principles  we  derive  the 
first  ride  of  wise  expenditure,  viz..  No  outlay  must  be  undertaken 
without  the  most  thorough  previous  consideration,  and  estimate  of 
the  involved  cost,  and  of  the  income  likely  to  accrue  from  the  same 
to  the  state  (II,  476) . 

389.  The  second  rule  is,  that  the  outlay  should  never  exceed 
the  income  (II,  478). 

390.  Rule  three. — For  all  outlays  the  "readiest  means"  must 
be  already  in  hand,  and  in  no  case  should  a  start  be  made  with  a 
debt  (II,  479)- 

391.  Rule  jour. — All  expenditures  of  the  state  must  be  made 
certain  (II,  480). 

392.  Ride  five. — No  outlay  should  be  made  which  tends  per- 
manently to  diminish  either  the  available  or  the  total  "means"  of 
the  state  (II,  481). 

393.  Rule  six. — So  far  as  possible,  outlays  should  be  so  ordered 
that  the  money  will  be  expended  within  the  state,  and  will  get  into 
circulation  in  the  sustaining  system  of  the  country  (II,  482). 

I  Justi  accuses  the  cameralistic  writers  of  having  failed  to  give  this 
subject  proportional  attention,  and  assigns  as  one  of  the  reasons  that 
they  have  had  little  faith  that  rulers  would  pay  attention  to  cameralistic 
precepts  on  the  subject.  Justi  disclaims  the  purpose  of  instructing 
courts  as  to  their  duties,  but  thinks  it  the  duty  of  cameralists  to  system- 
atize wise  rules  of  administration,  whether  rulers  adopt  them  or  not 


390  THE  CAMERALISTS 

394.  Rule  seven. — The  importance  of  every  proposed  outlay 
must  be  measured  by  the  amount  of  income  that  it  is  likely  to  return 
for  the  welfare  of  the  state  (II,  484). 

395.  Rule  eight. — Outlays  must  be  arranged  in  the  order  of 
their  usefulness  for  the  common  good  of  ruler  and  subjects  (II,  486). 

396.  The  great  management  of  the  state  bears  much  similarity 
to  the  housekeeping  of  private  persons;  hence  the  rules  that  are 
valid  in  private  housekeeping  apply,  with  changed  details,  to  the  use 
of  the  "means"  of  the  state  (II,  487). 

396A.  Rule  nine. — The  necessities  of  the  state  must  take  pre- 
cedence of  all  other  demands,  and  necessities  must  be  reckoned  in  the 
following  grades,  viz.:  (i)  Those  on  which  the  stability  of  the 
republic  depends;  (a)  those  which  are  of  qualified  necessity,  i.  e., 
from  omission  of  which  the  community  would  suffer  great  harm, 
such  as  loss  of  industries  through  failure  of  proper  promotion; 
(3)  those  which  might  be  omitted  without  positive  injury,  but  without 
which  the  maximum  happiness  of  the  state  cannot  be  reached 
(II,  488). 

397.  Even  expenses  of  the  first  grade  should  not  be  covered 
so  extravagantly  that  outlays  of  the  other  grades  would  be  impossible 
(II,  489). 

398.  Rule  ten. — Only  when  all  the  necessary  expenses  are 
provided  for  can  the  means  of  the  state  be  appropriated  to  con- 
veniencies  (II,  490). 

399.  Rule  eleven. — After  all  outlay  is  provided  for  which  is 
required  for  the  needs  and  conveniencies  of  the  state,  attention  may 
be  given  to  comfort,  dignity,  display,  and  ornamentation  (II,  491).* 

400.  Rule  twelve. — The  aim  should  be  to  put  the  finances  of  the 
country  in  such  condition  that  not  merely  the  necessities  and  con- 

'  Justi  adds:  "I  have  no  hesitation  in  giving  the  preference  to 
outlays  for  the  display  of  the  court:  for  since  the  chief  purpose  of  these 
outlays  is  to  impress  foreign  nations  with  the  prosperity  and  power  of  the 
state,  no  better  place  of  using  the  money  can  he  found  than  at  the  court 
of  the  monarch,  where  it  most  directly  appeals  to  the  eye  of  foreigners. 
Still,  that  which  is  appropriate  for  the  comfort  and  elegance  of  the 
country  in  other  places  must  not  be  forgotten.  It  is  not  consistent  if 
the  residence  charms  the  eye  of  foreigners,  while  the  rest  of  the  country 
has  a  poverty-stricken  appearance. 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  391 

veniencies,  but  also  the  comforts  and  elegancies  may  be  secured 
(II,  492). 

401.  Rule  thirteen. — If  the  government  is  to  be  in  a  situation 
to  make  fair  appropriations  of  all  kinds,  it  must  in  all  its  outlays 
observe  reasonable  economy  (II,  493). 

402.  Rule  fourteen. — Care  must  be  taken  that  economy  be  not 
turned  into  greed,  especially  through  contempt  of  the  ruler  for 
certain  needs  of  his  subjects,  while  his  passions  lead  him  to  favor 
other  outlays  (II,  495). 

403.  Rule  fifteen. — The  finance  bureau  must  constantly  have 
the  most  exact  information  about  the  condition  of  all  the  funds 
(II,  499). 

404.  Rule  sixteen. — No  disbursements  should  be  made  except 
upon  strict  account  (II,  500). 

405.  Rule  seventeen. — Entrepreneurs  should  be  used  in  all 
cases  which  involve  employment  of  a  large  number,  and  many 
minor  outlays  (II,  501). 

406.  Rule  eighteen. — Nothing  which  can  be  obtained  with  a 
lump  sum  should  be  subject  to  several  charges  (II,  305). 

407.  Rule  nineteen. — The  persons  expending  the  money  of  the 
state  should  not  themselves  make  additional  costs  necessary  (II,  504). 

408.  Rule  twenty. — Everything  must  be  supplied  at  the  proper 
time,  with  foresight  and  advantage,  and  by  cash  payments;  and 
when  it  is  profitable  stocks  of  goods  needed  by  the  state  should  be 
kept. 

409.  Rul^  twenty-one. — Strict  accounts,  in  perfect  order,  must 
be  kept  of  the  outlays  of  the  state  (II,  507).' 

410.  After  provision  for  the  military  budget  (II,  527-57),  and 
for  the  court  budget  (II,  560-86),  the  cameralistic  expenses  proper 
may  be  divided  into  eight  groups:  (i)  Moneys  for  the  civil-list 
and  dowries  (II,  588);    (2)  appropriations  for  the  various  admin- 

'  The  following  section,  viz.,  Division  Two,  "  Of  the  Proper  Ordering 
of  Expenditure,  or  the  General  Budget,"  contains  simply  considerations 
still  more  strictly  technical  and  does  not  call  for  analysis.  We  may  note 
one  important  precept,  viz.,  //  a  European  state  wants  to  have  influence, 
it  must  devote  at  least  two-thirds  of  its  revenues  to  the  military  budget 
(11,  533). 


392  THE  CAMERALISTS 

istrative  expenses  (II,  589) ;  (3)  the  expenses  of  levying  and  collect- 
ing the  revenues,  and  of  maintaining  the  sources  from  which  they  are 
derived  (II,  592) ;  (4)  the  salaries  and  pensions  of  all  civil  servants 
in  the  state,  finance,  jwlice,  and  justice  bureaus  (II,  597);  (5)  the 
expenses  of  bringing  land  under  cultivation  (II,  602) ;  (6)  the  expenses 
of  buildings  for  the  use  of  the  state  (II,  607);  (7)  the  support  of  the 
ecclesiastical  and  school  systems  (II,  609);  (8)  expenses  for  the 
comfort  and  adornment  of  the  country  (II,  613).' 

411.  The  organization  and  the  correlation  of  the  cameralistic 
system,  and  of  the  bureaus  belonging  to  it,  is  one  of  the  most  impor- 
tant elements  in  the  government  of  a  state.  The  whole  management 
of  a  community  rests  upon  it,  and  to  a  certain  extent  its  whole  internal 
constitution  rests  upon  it.  The  administrative  police  institutions 
of  the  state  are  a  part  of  the  cameral  system.  At  all  events  the  two 
arc  inseparable,  because  the  former  constitute  the  ground  of  the 
"readiest  means"  of  the  state  and  must  in  turn  be  supported  by  the 
same.  In  this  most  general  signification  of  the  cameral  system,  it 
comprehends  not  merely  all  police  institutions  and  measures,  and 
consequently  the  commercial  and  agricultural  administration,  but 
also  the  administration  of  justice,  at  least  so  far  as  concerns  the 
technique  of  the  same,  and  the  nature  [Beschaffenheit]  of  the  laws, 
as  well  as  the  management  of  the  military  system.  There  remain 
therefore  only  foreign  affairs,  which  may  be  contrasted  with  cameral 
business,  and  which  constitute  the  second  essential  element  in  the 
government  of  the  state.  Important  as  the  constitution  of  the 
cameral  system  is  then  in  itself,  it  is  especially  so  on  account  of  the 
peculiar  traits  of  our  times.  Since  the  European  powers  have  placed 
themselves  on  a  constant  war  footing,  since  they  have  made  it  a  part 

I  The  remainder  of  this  subdivision  (II,  614-60)  is  entirely  devoted 
to  the  routine  of  cameralistic  functions.  Justi  makes  the  topic  of  cor- 
relating the  different  kinds  of  cameral  administration  co-ordinate  with 
(a)  the  raising  of  funds;  (b)  the  reasonable  use  of  the  "means"  of  the 
state.  The  technique  of  this  organization  as  outlined  in  the  remainder 
of  the  Staatswirthschaft  contains  nothing  directly  material  to  our  purpose. 
Nevertheless,  as  a  bit  of  shading  for  the  picture  of  the  state  which  we 
have  already  found  in  the  book,  an  abstract  from  Justi's  introductioa 
to  the  section,  is  added. 


JUSTI'S  "STAATSWIRTHSCHAFT"  393 

of  their  programme  to  encourage  commerce  and  manufactures  and 
the  sustaining  class,  as  well  as  the  general  culture  of  their  countries, 
the  cameral  system  has  taken  on  a  quite  other  form.  Those  states 
in  which  the  rulers  two  or  three  hundred  years  ago  either  left  the 
finances  to  their  consorts,  or  intrusted  them  as  a  minor  duty  to  a 
privy  council  or  court,  now  have  various  great  and  important  bureaus 
for  the  administration  of  the  same,  and  meanwhile  the  revenues  have 
increased  five,  six,  and  ten  times  (II,  664).* 

«  The  remainder  of  the  book  contains  (i)  a  general  sketch  of  the 
administrative  organization  of  the  chief  European  states  (II,  666-84); 
(2)  a  brief  discussion  of  propositions  looking  to  improvement  of  the 
cameral  organization  (II,  684-88) ;  (3)  Justi's  own  programme  of  reor- 
ganization (II,  688-702) ;  (4)  the  fundamental  ordinances  and  technical 
processes  of  cameral  administration  (II,  702-44).  In  this  portion  of  the 
book  a  conspicuous  trait  of  Justi's  method  is  particularly  prominent,  viz., 
an  appearance  of  studied  effort  to  avoid  giving  credit  to  previous  writers. 
This  peculiarity  cannot  be  overlooked  as  a  symptom  of  the  literary 
practice  of  his  time,  as  the  usage  of  previous  cameralists  sufficiently 
shows.  Justi  was  exceptionally  unwilling  to  give  other  writers  their 
due  unless  they  were  safely  dead.  Montesquieu  is  the  only  author  whom 
he  frequently  mentions  by  name.  Only  three  or  four  others  are  men- 
tioned at  all  in  this  volume,  and  never  with  precise  reference  to  passages 
by  which  the  correctness  of  the  judgment  passed  upon  them  might  be 
decided.  When  Justi  refers  to  "other  cameralists"  who  have  proposed 
modifications  of  the  system,  he  gives  no  clue  to  their  identity,  so  that 
their  own  grounds  for  their  propositions  might  be  examined.  In  this 
respect  his  methods  are  as  crude  as  his  manners. 

I  regret  that  I  have  been  unable  to  secure  a  copy  of  the  work  in 
which  Justi  expanded  his  views  of  fiscal  science;  viz.,  Das  System  des 
Finanzwesens,  1766. 


CHAPTER  XV 
TUSTI'S  POLITICAL  PHILOSOPHY 

As  we  have  seen  from  various  points  of  approach,  cameralism 
was  not  primarily  a  philosophy,  nor  was  it  an  economic  theory 
in  the  modern  sense.  It  was  a  technique  and  a  technology. 
In  so  far  as  it  rested  on  a  basis  of  principles,  they  were  prima- 
rily political  rather  than  economic  generalizations.  That  is, 
political  purposes  were  chiefly  in  view,  and  economic  means 
were  enlisted  in  the  cameralistic  technique  to  promote  those 
purposes. 

If  would  be  easy  to  cull  out  of  Justi's  books  sentences 
from  which  we  might  infer  that  he  was,  in  the  last  analysis,  a 
full-fledged  democrat.  Such  an  inference,  however,  would 
be  as  unwarranted  as  the  contrary  conclusion  that  he  manifested 
no  democratic  opinions  or  sympathies.  The  plain  fact  is 
that  his  thinking  had,  so  to  speak,  special  apartments  for 
as  many  different  orders  of  opinions,  which  would  have  treated 
one  another  roughly  if  they  had  met  face  to  face.  Occupying 
separate  quarters  they  could  ignore  actual  incompatibilities. 

In  his  apartments  devoted  to  the  most  general  aspects  of 
life,  the  conspicuous  motto  on  the  wall  was:  "The  Happiness 
of  Ruler  and  Subjects." 

In  the  apartments  assigned  to  the  primary  necessities  of 
life,  the  fireside  talk  was  a  ringing  of  changes  upon  "Earn  and 
Save!" 

In  the  apartments  reserved  for  plans  and  programmes 
of  political  life  was  an  undertone,  always  audible,  droning 
variations  of  the  constant  theme:  "The  clue  to  life  is  a  good 
king,  with  well-trained  civil  servants  and  docile  subjects." 

Now,  it  would  be  folly  to  class  a  house  as  "disorderly" 
simply  because  its  tenants  were  of  such  diverse  types,  but  the 

394 


JUSTI'S  POLITICAL  PHILOSOPHY  395 

moment  it  becomes  necessary  for  the  lodgers  to  decide  upon 
a  common  standard  the  problem  of  harmonizing  these  con- 
ceptions is  imminent.  It  by  no  means  follows  that  their 
different  outlooks  upon  life  are  essentially  incompatible.  In 
composing  them,  however,  it  is  inevitable  that  different  forms 
and  contents  and  implications  of  each  will  from  time  to  time 
control,  and  that  one  of  the  main  conceptions  will  dominate 
the  others.  Men  will  ask  one  another.  What  is  happiness  ? 
How  is  it  composed?  What  does  it  involve?  Is  it  one 
and  the  same  thing  for  everybody,  or  does  it  vary  from 
man  to  man,  from  time  to  time,  from  place  to  place  ?  To 
what  extent  is  it  simply  our  own  affair,  and  to  what  extent 
does  it  depend  on  other  people  ?  Again,  they  will  ask,  How 
many  ways  are  there  to  earn  and  save  ?  What  do  these  ways 
have  to  do  with  one  another  ?  How  do  they  depend  on  one 
another?  What  advantages  has  one  over  another?  How 
far  may  the  arts  of  earning  and  saving  be  developed  beyond 
present  methods?  To  what  extent  may  we  discover  more 
fundamental  and  inclusive  principles  of  earning  and  saving 
and  of  guaranteeing  to  each  all  that  he  earns  and  saves? 
Still  further,  men  will  ask,  What  proof  have  we  that  kings 
are  essentials  to  life,  any  more  than  stone  hatchets,  or  bone 
fish-hooks?  Why  may  not  kings  and  paternalism  be  out- 
grown, just  like  wooden  plows,  and  bows  and  arrows,  and 
flint  and  steel  ?  W^hen  are  kings  and  kingcraft  good  and  when 
are  they  bad  ?  What  recourse  have  men  when  kings  and 
kingcraft  fail  ? 

Men  need  not  have  asked  all  these  questions  by  any  means, 
nor  others  equally  obvious,  before  they  would  be  capable  of 
seeing  that  Justi's  system,  however  useful  for  its  purpose, 
was  very  far  from  a  conclusive  science  of  the  things  with  which  it 
was  concerned.  It  contained  rudimentary  moral  and  economic 
and  political  philosophies  but  neither  of  these  philosophies 
had  been  thought  through,  and  the  relations  between  them 


30  THE  CAMERALISTS 

had  been  subjected  to  no  critical  analysis  whatsoever.  In 
effect  it  was  plans  and  specifications  of  the  best  paternalistic 
government  that  could  be  devised,  with  the  reservation  that 
no  questions  were  to  be  asked  about  the  finality  of  that  pater- 
nalistic government  as  an  irreducible  minimum.  It  was 
accordingly  a  system  of  operating  the  paternalistic  type  of 
state,  first  and  foremost,  so  that  it  could  maintain  itself  in 
the  rivalries  of  similar  neighboring  states,  through  systematic 
superintendence  and  stimulation  of  approved  thrift,  without 
prying  behind  the  precepts  of  commonplace  prudence,  and 
with  such  resulting  happiness  to  the  people  as  was  to  be  gained 
in  the  course  of  making  the  permanence  and  power  of  the 
paternalistic  state  the  supreme  end.  In  other  words,  so  far 
as  Justi's  type  of  cameralism  held  the  center  of  attention,  it 
postponed  all  larger  questions  of  social  science,  and  substituted 
for  them  a  catechism  of  the  routine  to  be  observed  in  govern- 
mental bureaus,  of  the  attitude  which  the  ruler  would  main- 
tain toward  government  and  subjects  if  his  views  agreed  with 
Justi's,  and  of  the  attitude  which  the  subject  should  main- 
tain in  any  event  toward  ruler  and  administration.  Otherwise 
expressed,  all  the  social  science  there  was  within  the  sphere 
of  cameralism  was  first,  as  we  shall  see  presently,  a  more  or 
less  explicit  pcjlitical  philosophy,  then  a  managerial  ritual, 
with  no  positive  provision  either  for  revising  the  ritual  itself 
or  for  reappraising  the  purposes  which  the  ritual  was  supposed 
to  serve.  It  had  the  same  relation  to  the  problems  of  society 
in  general  that  a  b<x>k  on  tactics  would  have  to  statesmanship.' 
In  applying  the  term  "ritual"  to  Justi's  cameralism,  I 
do  not  mean  to  assert  that  it  was  necessarily  arbitrary  in  detail. 
On  the  contrary,  the  larger  number  of  its  precepts  were  emi- 

>  Parts  of  the  contents  of  Justi's  lKX>ks  might  be  cited  as  proof  that 
the  comparison  is  an  exaggeration,  cs|>e(  iaily  the  volume,  Naiur  und 
Wtsen  der  Staaten.  If  substance,  not  form,  is  decisive,  the  parallel  is 
exact. 


JUSTI'S  POLITICAL  PHILOSOPHY  397 

nently  reasonable.  The  ritualism  came  from  its  relation 
to  the  major  premise,  viz.,  the  finality  of  the  paternalistic 
state.  As  items  in  the  operation  of  such  a  moral  economy 
as  present  analysis  discovers  in  human  experience,  these 
same  precepts  might  be  no  more  ritualistic  than  valid  rules 
of  hygiene. 

This  appraisal  of  Justi's  system  may  be  varied  as  follows: 
It  was  an  undigested  mixture  of  judgments  about  means  and 
ends.  It  did  not  consciously  encounter  the  previous  question, 
viz.,  How  shall  we  know  when  such  means  as  the  type  of  state, 
and  ruler,  and  bureaucracy  which  we  now  take  for  granted, 
and  which  are  at  present  assumed  to  be  indispensable  for 
the  t)rpes  of  ends  which  we  also  take  for  granted,  lose  their 
value  as  means,  to  such  an  extent  that  we  can  no  longer  take 
them  for  granted  as  approximate  ends  ?  The  parallel  question 
would  also  have  challenged  the  authority  of  Justi's  system, 
but  it  had  not  appeared  above  his  horizon;  viz..  How  may  we 
know  when  the  types  of  ends  which  we  take  for  granted  cease 
to  satisfy  the  conditions  of  life,  and  consequently  impeach  the 
means  on  which  we  have  relied  for  the  conduct  of  life  ?  That 
is,  the  autocratic  state  and  ruler  and  bureaucracy  had  so 
imposed  themselves  on  the  thoughts  and  feelings  of  the  time 
that  they  were  virtually  valued  as  both  means  and  end  of 
human  purposes,  and  criticism  of  them  to  discover  how  far 
they  were  merely  provisional  means  to  mediate  ends  was 
marking  time  in  the  cameralistic  technology.  Meanwhile, 
such  larger  social  philosophy  as  ventured  to  show  signs  of 
life  within  or  around  this  technology  was  in  its  primary  charac- 
teristics more  prominently  political  than  economic.  We  shall 
attempt  to  justify  this  judgment  by  an  examination,  first, 
of  the  Natur  und  Wesen  der  Staaten,  and  second,  of  tlie  Grund- 
riss  einer  Guten  Regierung. 

Of  these  two  books,  which  we  shall  notice  not  in  meir 
chronological  but  in  their  logical  order,  we  may  first  observe 


398  THE  CAMERALISTS 

in  general,  that  they  merely  elaborate  themes  which  were 
contained  in  Staatswirthschaft.  Indeed  that  volume  in  prin- 
ciple exhausts  Justi's  cameralism.  The  later  volumes  con- 
tain nothing  except  illustrative  material  which  was  implied, 
if  not  expressed,  in  the  earlier  synoptic  book.  We  shall  there- 
fore be  able  to  do  justice  to  these  volumes,  as  expansions  of 
Justi's  system,  without  the  detailed  analysis  which  was  neces- 
sary in  presenting  his  general  survey. 

We  turn  to  the  more  fundamental  of  these  special  treatises.* 
If  thi*-beok  had  been  written  for  the  purpose  of  supporting 
our  main  thesis  about  cameralism  as  essentially  a  political 
rather  than  an  economic  theory,  it  could  hardly  have  been 
more  unequivocal.'  For  our  purposes  the  Preface  is  most 
important,  because  the  body  of  the  book  merely  enlarged 
upon  principles  which  are  sufficiently  prominent  in  our  account 
of  Staatswirthschaft.  ,.,<*» 

The  contents  of  the  Preface  may  be  summarized  in  this  way: 

Montesquieu's  Esprit  des  Lois  is  in  many  respects  an  exemplary 
book,  but  it  contains  certain  errors  which  should  be  corrected. 

This  book  may  be  regarded  as  an  alternative  treatise  on  the 
spirit  of  the  laws  [Geist  der  Gesetze].  "After  I  have  discussed  the 
essence  and  nature  of  states,  and  have  pointed  out  the  errors  of 
Montesquieu  in  this  connection,  I  come  to  the  essence  [H^M«n] 
of  the  laws,  which  are  the  means  through  which  states  must  attain 
their  es.sential  pur[)osc,-  namely,  the  common  happiness  \gemein- 
schajtliche  Gliickseligkeit],  which  means  can  be  derived  nowhere 
else  than  from  the  essence  and  nature  of  states  as  their  chief  source." 

■  Die  Natur  und  das  Wesen  der  Staaten,  als  die  Grundwissenschaft 
der  Staatskunst,  der  Policey,  und  alter  Regierungswissenschaften,  des- 
gleicken  als  die  Quelle  alter  Gesetze,  abgchandelt  von  Johann  Heinrich 

Gottlob  von  Justi,  Berlin,  Stettin  und  Leipzig 1760  (488  pages 

+  index  of  32  pages). 

»  It  was  not  from  this  book,  however,  that  I  arrived  at  my  interpreta- 
tion. Long  before  I  discovered  it,  I  had  reached  my  conclusion  from 
equally  decisive  but  less  obvious  evidence. 


JUSTI'S  POLITICAL  PHILOSOPHY  399 

"It  will  easily  be  seen  that  this  book  contains  the  fundamental 
science  of  all  the  economic  and  cameral  sciences,  and  that  it  con- 
stitutes, so  to  speak,  a  sort  of  political  metaphysic  for  all  the  govern- 
mental sciences.  For  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  all  these  sciences 
must  be  based  upon  the  essence  and  nature  of  a  (sic)  state,  and  there- 
from alone,  as  from  their  fountain-head  [Hauptqiielle],  must  be 
derived." 

We  have  inverted  the  order  of  Justi's  paragraphs,  so  as 
to  place  his  more  general  propositions  first,  without  affecting 
his  thought.  The  more  specific  reason  which  he  assigns  for 
writing  the  book  is  in  the  earlier  paragraphs  of  the  Preface,  viz. : 

I  made  the  plan  of  this  work  five  years  ago.'  Meanwhile  it  has 
reshaped  itself  in  my  mind,  in  accordance,  as  I  think,  with  a  better 
general  idea  which  I  have  meanwhile  formed.  The  necessity  of  such 
a  work  was  evident  to  me*  from  the  time  that  I  began  to  write  upon 
the  economic  and  cameral  sciences. 

All  these  sciences,  and  all  those  which  are  required  for  the  gov- 
ernment of  a  state,  must  in  a  word  be  derived  from  the  general  nature 
and  essence  of  states,  and  nothing  can  be  securely  established  in 
them  if  one  does  not  constantly  look  back  to  the  nature  of  civic 
institutions  [bUrgerlichen  Verfassungen].  If  accordingly  I  would 
justify  this  or  that  principle  or  rule  in  Staatskunst,  in  Policey,  in 
Finanz-Wissenschaft,  and  the  other  economic  sciences,  I  had  to 
trace  the  grounds  of  the  same  very  remotely  [weitlUuftig]  from  the 
essence  and  the  nature  of  states;  and  when  this  principle  or  rule 
emerged  in  another  portion  of  these  sciences,  it  was  necessary  to 
repeat  the  most  important  grounds,  in  order  to  show  the  harmony 
of  the  same  with  the  essence  of  civic  institutions.  I  judged  accord- 
ingly that  a  special  treatise  on  the  essence  and  the  nature  of  states 
would  serve  my  own  as  well  as  my  readers'  convenience,  since  I 
would  not  then  be  under  the  necessity,  in  all  my  subsequent  works, 

« If  we  take  the  statement  literally,  it  would  locate  this  passage  in 
Justi's  thinking  during  the  interval  between  his  departure  from  Vienna 
and  his  arrival  in  Gbttingen,  i.  e.,  about  a  year  before  publication  of 
Staatswirthschaft.  It  is  not  unlikely  that  revision  of  his  notes  for  that 
volume  clarified  his  ideas  in  the  direction  of  the  book  before  us. 


400  THE  CAMERALISTS 

repeatedly  to  show  the  correspondence  of  my  fundamental  pro()osi- 
tions  with  the  nature  of  a  state. 

Thus  we  have  Jusd's  own  direct  testimony  that  all  the 
sciences  embraced  in  the  general  sense  of  the  term  cameralism 
were,  in  his  view,  deductions  from  a  fundamental  p>olitical 
philosophy.  Moreover,  all  activities  in  civic  society  were 
to  find  their  rationale  in  this  a  priori,  viz.,  the  presupposed 
"essence  and  nature  of  states."  This  concept  served  in  Justi's 
thinking  as  the  finality  back  of  which  analysis  could  not  pene- 
trate. A  large  part  of  the  difference  between  this  type  of 
thinking  and  modem  sociological  inquiry  is  a  consequence 
of  (>enetration  by  the  latter  into  the  social  processes  antecedent 
in  time  to  the  existence  of  states,  or  more  general  in  content 
than  civic  activities.  The  resultant  perception  that  states 
are  but  one  of  the  many  variations  of  means  by  which  men 
seek  to  accomplish  their  purposes  displaces  the  concept ' '  essence 
and  nature  of  states"  as  the  ultimate  term  in  explanation  of 
civic  activities,  and  substitutes  the  essence  and  nature  of 
associating  persons,  whose  purposes  give  the  sliding  scale 
of  values  to  all  their  machineries. 

The  argument  of  Natur  und  Wesen  may  be  compressed 
into  the  following  r^sum^: 

First,  the  assumption  of  an  original  condition  of  "natural  free- 
dom" Tchap.  vii).  Justi's  particular  version  of  "natural  freedom" 
need  not  be  analyzed  in  detail.  While  he  does  not  arrive  at  a  plau- 
sible hypothesis  of  reconciliation  between  the  notion  of  the  freedom 
of  individuals  and  freedom  of  groups,  within  which  there  was  no 
freedom,  he  satisfies  himself  that  there  is  enough  in  the  idea  for  a 
major  premise,  and  he  pixKeeds  to  build  upon  it. 

Second,  the  derivation  of  social  life  from  an  inborn  "social 
impulse"  is  denied  (I5).  On  the  contrary,  perception  of  advantage 
fmm  social  reciprocity,  i.  e.,  in  the  last  resort,  reason  [Vemimft\, 
is  the  cause  of  social  life  (|6).  With  the  development  of  circum- 
stances, and  corresponding  development  of  wants,  the  utility  of 


JUSTI'S  POLITICAL  PHILOSOPHY  401 

extending  social  combinations  ap^tealed  to  developing  reason.  Fear 
was  one  of  the  tributary  motives.  Some  more  intelligent  men 
began  to  see  the  advantage  of  using  compulsion  upon  weaker  men, 
subjecting  them  to  their  laws,  and  making  them  serve  their  own 
advantage  and  conscience.  Thus  the  condition  of  compelling  or 
being  compelled,  the  condition  of  war,  took  its  origin.  Hence  come 
consolidation  of  related  societies  into  larger  societies,  in  order  to  offer 
more  resistance  to  less  closely  related  societies  (§7).* 

Third,  these  aggregations  of  people  in  societies  do  not  yet  con- 
stitute republics.  Mutual  aid  [Beystaftd\  is  the  purpose  of  societies, 
but  republics  have  an  incomparably  greater  purpose.  In  these 
societies  all  men  lived  still  in  the  state  of  natural  freedom.  Each 
was  subject  to  his  own  will  and  laws  in  so  far  as  he  was  not  constrained 
by  others.  Since  they  had  not  yet  merged  their  will,  the  will  of 
each  was  entirely  free.  It  was  within  the  free  choice  of  each  to  make 
use  of  the  advantage  of  reciprocal  support,  or  to  forego  the  same  and 
to  live  each  for  himself.  This  freedom  to  step  out  of  society  at  will 
is  common  to  all  societies  which  have  no  overlord,  or  which  do  not 
live  under  the  laws  of  a  republic.  Pardculaiiy,  however,  the  differ- 
ence between  societies  and  republics  consists  in  the  latter  having  a 
supreme  power  set  over  them,  while  the  former  have  not.  When 
therefore  the  societies  compel  one  of  their  members  to  conform  to 
their  purposes  and  to  the  social  compacts,  this  occurs  according  to 
the  laws  and  the  condition  of  war,  not  however  according  to  the  nature 
of  a  supreme  power  (§9). 

It  may  be  asked  whether  it  were  not  pos^ble  that  men  could  have 
lived  in  the  condition  of  natural  freedom  in  such  societies,  without 
creating  republics.  In  my  opinion  that  is  precisely  the  question 
which  is  put  in  theology  when  is  is  asked  whether  it  were  not  possible 
that  men  might  have  continued  in  the  state  of  innocence,  .... 
(5io). 

Rather  is  it  probable  that  increasing  vice  and  license,  which 
disturbed  the  internal  peace  of  these  societies,  was  the  immediate  cause 
of  adopting  civic  laws  and  institutions.  When  such  disorden  occurred 
the  most  reputable  and  reasonable  must  naturally  have  set  them- 
■Hves  up  as  arbiters,  in  order  to  abate  the  evils  and  to  restore  peace. 

«  Justi  rejects  Hobbes's  theory  of  the  inborn  propensity  to  domineer. 


402  THE  CAMERALISTS 

....  This  was  a  way  to  laws,  or  a  beginning  of  them.  The 
approach  to  civic  institutions  became  closer  and  closer,  while  people 
were  probably  not  conscious  of  it.  .  .  .  (§ii)- 

Thc  actual  institution  of  rcpuVilics  was  probably  not  after  one 
fashion,  but  (i)  through  the  growth  of  patriarchal  power  into 
actual  overlordship  (§12);  (2)  through  the  respect  and  eminence 
which  certain  men  gained  in  their  societies  (§13);  (3)  through 
instruction  of  the  people  by  skilled  and  experienced  men,  in  the  ways 
of  attaining  the  comforts  of  human  life  (§14);  (4)  the  leaders  of  new 

colonies  have  thereby  at  the  same  time  founded  states  (§15) 

The  earliest  states  were  small  monarchies,  these  being  the  most 
natural  transition  from  freedom  to  civic  institutions  (§16).  All 
these  little  monarchies  were  very  mild  and  differed  very  little  from 
the  condition  of  natural  freedom The  people  in  their  assem- 
blies always  retained  the  law-giving  power  in  their  hands 

The  kings  and  princes  had  only  the  right  to  propose  and  to  convince 
by  argument  (vide  Tacitus,  Germania,  chap.  xi).  Only  in  time  of 
war  had  the  magistrates,  according  to  the  testimony  of  Julius  Caesar 
{de  hello  Gal.,  lib.  vi),  right  over  life  and  death.  This  however  was 
demanded  by  the  nature  of  the  case,  if  a  commander  were  to 
accomplish  anything  (§17).  From  this  slight  removal  of  the  first 
states  from  the  condition  of  natural  freedom,  as  well  as  from  the 
unobserved  growth  of  the  civic  organization,  it  follows  in  my  opinion 
indubitably  that  men  never  chose  to  subject  themselves  to  a  severe 
form  of  government.  This  intention  of  the  peoples  is  also  founded 
in  the  nature  of  the  case.  Men  would  have  been  the  most  insane 
fools  if  they  had  been  willing  delil>erately  to  exchange  their  most 
precious  possession,  freedom,  for  a  government  under  which  they 
would  l>e  slaves.  The  will  of  the  peoples,  upon  entrance  into  repub- 
lics, was  thus  doubtless  this:  that  they  would  surrender  their  natural 
freedom  and  subject  themselves  to  the  government  and  laws  of  another 
only  in  so  far  as  necessary  for  the  ultimate  purpose  of  the  republics. 
Who  however  would  deny  that  this  will  of  the  peoples  must  not  be 
regarded  in  each  and  every  government  ?'     Besides  this,  the  impulse 

■  Justi's  frequent  use  of  the  double  negative  without  the  affirmative 
force  makes  a  puzzle  of  such  a  sentence  as  this,  in  which  the  meaning 
cannot  Vx;  positively  fixed  V)y  the  context.     I  think  the  above  rendering 


JUSTI'S  POLITICAI.  PHILOSOPHY  40^ 

to  dominate  over  others  is  not  "grounded  in  human  nature  It  is 
merely  a  consequence  of  a  mediocre  understanding.  Men  undoubt- 
edly presuppose  that  they  wish  to  be  ruled  by  a  perfect  understandinj?. 
This  advantage,  this  quality,  can  alone  move  them  to  intrust  to 
another  the  government  over  themselves.  Indeed,  since  finally  God 
has  put  us  in  the  world  with  equal  freednm,  dignity,  and  rights, 
I  derive  from  all  this  the  conclusion  that  it  is  the  duty  and  obligation 
of  every  government  to  limit  the  natural  freedom  of  its  subjects,  only 
in  so  far  as  the  ultimate  purpose  of  republics  requires,  and  that  always 
the  best  government  is  the  one  which  without  interference  with  the 
ultimate  purpose  of  republics  most  nearly  approaches  natural  free- 
dom. This  conclusion,  which  follows  from  the  origin  of  republics, 
I  regard  as  a  fundamental  principle,  which  I  shall  often  use  in  treat- 
ing the  sciences  of  government  (§18). 

Justi  appears  to  have  entertained  no  doubt  of  the  cogency 
and  conclusiveness  of  this  patchwork  of  guesses  and  irrelevan- 
cies  and  non-sequiturs.  In  contrast  with  Schroder,  Justi  had 
exchanged  the  theological  for  a  pseudo-rationalistic  major 
premise.  There  is  no  change  in  the  tinality,  for  practical 
purposes,  of  the  pseudo-absolutism  which  the  premise  supports. 
The  twentieth-century  mind  finds  extreme  difficulty  in  believ- 
ing that  an  adult  accustomed  to  reflection  could  ever  have 
rested  content  with  the  puerilities  of  either  argument.  We 
flatter  ourselves,  however,  by  underestimating  the  capacity 
even  of  the  so{)histicatcd  mind  for  self-deception.  The  psy- 
chological situation,  in  the  case  both  of  Schroder  and  of  Justi, 
was  first  the  unquestioned  concrete  datum,  the  existing  abso- 
lutistic  state;  and  second,  the  problem,  to  find  a  thread  of 
association  which  would  act  as  binding-twine  anrl  hold  together 
with  this  datum   the  remaining  assortment  of  ideas  in   the 

faithfully  reflects  the  ambiguity.  The  original  rca<ls:  "Wer  uolltc 
aber  wohl  laugnen.  dass  <lieser  Wille  c|er  Wilker  bey  alien  und  jeden 
Regierungen  nicht  in  Betraclit  gezogen  wcrdcn  miisstc?"  I  understand 
Justi  to  urge  the  antecedent  probability  that  every  government  would 
regard  the  will  of  the  subjects. 


404  THE  CAMERALISTS 

minds  of  the  authors  themselves  and  of  their  contemporaries. 
The  effectiveness  of  the  notions  which  proved  to  serve  this 
purpose  was  evidently  derived,  not  from  logic  but  from  sug- 
gestion. The  datum  " absolutistic  state"  was  no  more  deduced 
from  Schroder's  or  Justi's  premises  than  the  earth  was  deduced 
from  Atlas.  A  plausible  justification  for  the  cameralistic 
state  was  set  up,  not  so  much  in  the  uncritical  explanation 
of  its  origin,  as  in  the  presumption  that  it  was  supematurally 
devoted  and  adapted  to  its  purpose  of  serving  the  general 
interest. 

Throughout  Justi's  writings  the  idea  of  the  common  good, 
as  the  ultimate  end  of  the  state,  repeatedly  recurs.  The  impli- 
cations of  the  idea  are  indefinite,  but  it  unquestionably  contains 
elements  which  went  into  the  structure  of  later  democratic 
conceptions.'  A  suspensive  veto,  so  to  speak,  was  held  over 
these  democratic  elements  by  the  inveterate  assumption  that 
the  government  was  actually  conforming  to  its  destiny  of 
preternatural  wisdom  and  righteousness  in  the  interest  of 
all  concerned,  whatever  might  be  the  immediate  appearances 
to  the  contrary.  Thus  the  actual  order  of  thought  in  Justi's 
political  philosophy  was,  first,  the  state  as  it  is  must  be  accepted 
as  the  ultimate  human  recourse  for  promotion  of  temporal 
happiness;  second,  the  details  involved  in  the  conception 
"temporal  happiness"  must  be  learned  by  experience;  third, 
rulers  must  be  relied  upon  to  show  the  wisdom  and  righteous- 
ness requisite  for  setting  in  operation,  in  due  time,  the  measures 
which  will  secure  their  subjects  temporal  happiness. 

In  a  later  paragraph  (§23)  Justi  emphasizes  the  crucial 
conception  in  this  philosophy,  viz.,  the  merging  of  the  wills 

'  This  may  be  inferred  from  the  very  significant  fact  that  Jtisti 
sometimes  uses  the  still  more  democratic  phrase,  GlUckseligkeit  der 
Unterthanen,  as  designation  of  the  ultimate  purpose  of  the  state  (e.  g^ 
I36),  The  whole  conception  was  as  yet,  however,  a  matter  of  rhetoric 
rather  than  a  decisive  factor  in  statecraft. 


JUSTI'S  POLITICAL  PHILOSOPHY  405 

of  many  free  individuals  into  a  single  will.  This  ct)nceit  was 
not  the  democratic  idea  of  a  constantly  re-established  consen- 
sus between  the  members  of  the  state.  It  was  a  notion  of 
transference  of  the  individual  wills  to  the  ruler,  and  their 
fusion  in  him  into  a  transcendent  will.  This  occurred  once 
for  all.  Subsequent  generations  had  nothing  to  do  but  accept 
the  arrangement.  The  use  to  which  this  conception  is  put  is 
indicated  in  general  in  the  opening  paragraph  of  the  third 
chapter,  as  follows: 

The  merging  of  many  wills  into  a  single  will  is  the  first  moral 
ground  of  republics,  and  that  which  chiefly  constitutes  the  civic 
condition.  If  many  wills  are  to  be  consolidated  in  a  single  will, 
they  must  all  have  one  and  the  same  paramount  purpose,  and  this 
chief  purjwse  of  each  must  include  all  their  special  and  incidental 
purposes.  In  short,  those  who  merge  their  wills  must  all  have  a 
common  paramount  purpose  which  leads  all  their  transactions. 
The  question  then  is,  Wherein  does  this  paramount  purpose  consist 
which  produces  the  merging  of  the  wills  in  the  founding  and  building 
of  republics  ?  This  ultimate  purpose  can  be  no  other  than  the  uni- 
versal best  [das  allgemeine  Beste],  the  welfare  of  each  and  every  one 
of  the  families  which  as  aforesaid  merged  with  one  another,  in  a 
word  the  common  happiness  [gemeinschafUiche  Gluckseligkcil]  of 
the  whole  state. 

At  this  point  a  single  comment  will  be  sufficient.  If  Justi's 
conception  of  the  general  welfare  had  actually  been  the  prime 
consideration  in  his  reasoning,  he  would  have  been  forced  to 
make  it  the  major  premise  of  an  objective  critique  of  the  com- 
petence of  absolutism  to  attain  the  involved  results.  This 
plane  of  reasoning  was  beyond  Justi.  It  turns  out  that,  in  effect, 
the  perpetuation  of  the  absolutistic  state  is  the  ultimatum  in 
his  system,  and  that  the  general  good  comes  to  its  own  only  as 
a  secondary  consideration,  in  so  far  as  it  can  subordinate  itself 
to  the  actually  paramount  interests  of  the  quasi-absolutistic 
governments  which  pwDsed  as  embodiments  of  the  welfare  of 


4o6  THE  CAMERALISTS 

their  peoples.  The  striking  peculiarity  of  the  transitional 
type  of  thinking  which  Justi  represents  was  not  its  insistence 
upon  the  welfare  of  the  people  as  the  ultimate  aim.  It  was 
rather  its  constant  resort  to  the  assumption  that  actual  gov- 
ernments were  more  inerrant  in  their  pursuit  of  this  end  than 
any  other  available  civic  system  could  possibly  be.  Herewith 
we  have  in  principle  the  whole  of  Justi's  political  philosophy. 
His  elaboration  of  it,  on  the  institutional  side,  in  the  remainder 
of  this  volume  is  merely  an  expansion  of  the  corresponding 
sections  in  Slaatswirthschaft.  We  shall  find  more  explicit 
description  of  civic  well-being  itself,  as  Justi  conceived  it,  in 
the  second  of  his  volumes  on  political  philosophy.* 

A  general  estimate  of  another  factor  in  Justi's  thinking 
is  pertinent  at  this  point;  viz.,  the  evident  line  of  cleavage 
between  the  technological  and  the  idealistic  elements  in  his 
books.  Justi  was  apparently  only  half-conscious,  if  even  so 
much,  of  the  mixture  of  elements.  On  the  one  hand  he  was 
systematizing  the  actual  technique  of  governmental  adminis- 
tration. On  the  other  hand  he  was  describing  the  spirit  and 
details  of  governments  as  they  should  be.  If  one  were  to  read 
him  without  this  distinction  in  mind  one  might  reach  utterly 
unwarranted  conclusions  about  the  modcmness  of  his  philoso- 
phy. The  reservation  must  always  be  remembered  that  his 
theory  had  no  place  for  an  ultimate  appeal  beyond  the  authority 
of  the  constituted  government,  as  the  last  resort  of  peoples. 
The  government  was  the  final  moral  arbiter,  against  whose 
decrees  the  citizens  had  no  recourse.  This  was  not  merely 
the  working  condition,  but  the  philosophical  theory  supported 
the  conditions.  At  the  same  time,  parallel  with  this  theory  and 
practice,  a  body  of  ethical  judgments  was  taking  shape  which 
constituted  a  standard  of  political  attainificnt  destined  pres- 

'  Der  Grundriss  einer  Cuten  Regierung.  In  Fiinf  Biichem  verfasset, 
von  Johann  Heinrich  Gottlob  von  Justi,  Koniglichem  Grossbritannischen 
Bcrgrath.     Frankfurth  und  Leipzig,  1759. 


JUSTI'S  POLITICAL  PHILOSOPHY  407 

ently  to  hail  existing  rulers  before  the  bar  of  a  more  highly 
evolved  justice.  This  more  far-seeing  justice  shows  itself 
in  Justi's  accounts  of  the  purposes  and  technique  of  adminis- 
tration. The  dilemma  presented  by  these  two  elements  had 
not  yet  been  frankly  admitted.  The  French  Revolution 
first  brought  it  into  distinct  view.  In  a  word  it  was  this :  The 
proper  moral  standards  of  governments  are  such  and  such ;  the 
actual  moral  standards  of  governments  are  much  inferior; 
there  is  no  recognized  means  of  compelling  governments  to 
adopt  the  higher  standards;  does  the  logic  of  the  civic  relation 
then  require  men  to  leave  moral  standards  at  the  mercy  of 
governments,  or  have  men  a  deeper  right  to  enforce  subordi- 
nation of  governments  to  the  higher  sovereignty  of  morals  ? 

In  the  philosophy  which  Justi  represents  this  inevitable 
conjunction  of  ideas  had  not  been  reached.  The  two  anti- 
thetical, yet  necessarily  related  conceptions  and  their  corol- 
laries were  in  existence  side  by  side,  but  they  had  not  been 
reconciled,  and  the  need  of  a  reconciliation  was  not  yet  dis- 
tinctly formulated. 

The  book  just  mentioned  begins  with  a  version  of  the 
same  argument  which  was  presented  in  Natur  und  Wesen. 
Avoiding  repetition  as  much  as  possible,  we  may  draw  from 
the  present  volume  certain  details  in  completion  of  the  account 
of  Justi's  system. 

Without  the  proviso  just  urged,  we  should  be  inclined  to 
believe  we  had  stumbled  upon  a  prophet  of  modern  democracy 
when  we  read  (§1): 

The  nature,  essence,  and  ultimate  purpose  [Endzweck]  of  states 
are  the  only  criteria  by  which  to  decide  what  is  a  good  government. 

Passing  propositions  which  have  already  been  quoted  in 
other  connections,  we  read  (§4) : 

Every  human  being  has  an  energy  [Krajt]  of  his  own.  If  many 
human  beings  combine  in  a  society,  there  results  a  composite  energy, 
which  is  in  proportion  to  the  number  of  persons.    Every  person 


4o8  THE  CAMERALISTS 

in  society  has  a  share  in  this  composite  great  energy.  He  is  thus 
much  stronger  than  the  isolated  man.  Participation  in  the  great 
energy  of  society  is  thus  the  ultimate  purpose  of  societies.' 

The  will  of  each  human  being  is  to  promote  his  own  happiness. 
When  therefore  many  human  beings  combine  their  wills,  and  resign 
to  this  combined  will  the  use  of  their  energy,  i.  e.,  when  they  set  over 
themselves  a  supreme  px)wer,  and  subordinate  their  particular  will 
to  it,  there  can  be  no  other  intent  than  that  each  identifies  his  own 
happiness  with  the  happiness  of  the  whole  society.  The  common 
happiness  is  accordingly  the  ultimate  purpose  of  civic  structures 
(§5;    vide  pp.  5iff.).» 

'  Justi's  form  of  expression  seems  to  imply  in  the  first  place  that  the 
"great  energy"  of  societies  is  merely  the  arithmetical  sum  of  the  energies 
of  the  individuals.  This  being  the  case,  one  wonders  just  how  he  pic- 
tured the  process  of  getting  out  of  that  total  more  than  was  put  in.  He 
evidently  assumed  that  something  more  than  a  mere  addition  took  place 
in  society,  but  his  account  of  the  situation  leaves  the  essentials  to  be 
desired.  The  chief  crudeness  in  this  section  of  Justi's  philosophy  is 
not  in  the  description  of  the  central  fact  of  a  state,  but  in  the  absence  of 
analysis  of  the  sources  of  the  "general  will"  or  "supreme  power."  The 
non  sequitur  is  at  once  in  operation  that  a  certain  representative  or 
repository  of  this  "general  will,"  say  the  monarch  of  a  European  state, 
being  given,  the  concurrence  of  social  forces  by  which  that  monarch 
came  into  existence  has  served  its  day  and  generation,  and  has  gone  out 
of  business,  leaving  the  monarch  virtually  absolute.  I  find  no  direct 
evidence  that  Justi  consciously  borrowed  anything  from  Hobbes,  but 
the  assumptions  of  the  former  are  quite  in  accord  with  the  philosophy 
of  the  latter.  Justi  feels  at  liberty  to  tell  when  rulers  ought  to  be  ashamed 
of  themselves,  but  he  has  no  recourse  short  of  judgments  of  God  if  they 
do  not  mend  their  ways  {vide  Grundriss,  pp.  77  ff.). 

»  From  this  point  the  fallacy  of  confounding  means  and  ends  is  con- 
stantly on  duty.  The  particular  mode  of  uniting  the  associated  wills  is 
assumed  to  be  identical  with,  if  not  paramount  to,  the  concept  "common 
happiness."  Consequently  this  particular  mode  of  controlling  association, 
the  absolute  state,  is  substituted  as  paramount  purpose,  for  a  developing 
idea  of  "common  happiness"  which  would  hold  any  mtans  of  its  own  reali- 
zation, e.  g.,  any  form  of  civic  constitution,  as  constantly  liable  to  answer 
for  its  results,  and  to  modification  as  the  actual  paramount  purpose  from 
time  to  time  seemed  to  demand. 


JUSTI'S  POLITICAL  PHILOSOPHY  409 

Hence  arises  a  state,  a  republic,  a  "common  being"  [f;emeines 
Wesen].^  These  three  concepts  are  identical,  if  one  takes  the  word 
republic  in  the  most  general  sense,  as  its  chief  significance  demands. 
A  state  or  republic,  however,  is  a  society  of  human  beings  who  have 
combined  with  one  another  in  order  to  promote  their  common  happi- 
ness under  a  sovereign  power;  or,  in  other  words,  a  state  consists 
of  many  families,  that  have  united  their  energies  and  their  will  with 
one  another  in  order  to  combine  the  happiness  of  each  particular 
family  with  the  common  good  (§6). 

Such  a  society  of  human  beings  is  called  a  people  [Fo/ife],  and  it 
is  a  ground  of  the  state  without  which  a  state  cannot  be  thought, 
that  such  a  people  occupies  a  certain  portion  of  the  earth's  surface, 
which  is  their  peculiar  possession,  and  which  we  call  the  country 
or  land  [Land]  (§8). 

When  a  people  thus  unites  its  energy  and  its  will,  and  intrusts 
the  use  of  the  combined  energy  to  the  master- will;  that  is,  when  it 
establishes  a  supreme  power,  this  power  rests  in  the  beginning 
unquestionably  with  the  people,  since  it  originates  through  the 
unification  of  their  energies  and  wills.  The  people  can  accordingly 
either  exercise  this  power  themselves  and  make  ordinances  about 
that  exercise,  or  it  can  transfer  such  exercise  to  others.  AH  power 
in  the  state  springs  therefore  from  the  people  [Volk]  which  is  always 
the  source  of  the  same.  The  power  therefore,  by  virtue  of  which 
the  people  makes  ordinances  about  the  exercise  of  the  supreme 
power,  or  transfers  such  responsibility  to  others,  is  called  the  funda- 
mental power  [Grundgeivalt]  of  the  people,  and  is  distinguished  from 
the  active  supreme  power,  which  originates  only  through  the  ordina- 
tion of  the  former.  This  fundamental  power  of  the  people  is  a  part 
of  the  essence  of  the  state,  and  is  always  present,  even  with  the  most 
unlimited  supreme  power.  It  can  be  overthrown  only  by  destruc- 
tion of  the  state,  either  through  total  subjugation  by  an  alien  enemy, 
or  through  internal  tyranny  (§9).* 

'  No  precise  English  equivalent  for  the  content  which  Justi  put  into 
this  phrase  can  be  found. 

»  This  is  perhaps  the  most  distinct  formulation  of  fundamental 
democracy  to  be  found  in  Justi's  books.  It  would  be  misrepresentation 
if  I  should  try  to  explain  it  away.     It  is  simply  a  partially  assimilated 


4IO  THE  CAMERALISTS 

When  a  people,  by  virtue  of  its  fundamental  power,  determines 
how  the  active  supreme  power  shall  be  exercised,  it  ordains  funda- 
mental laws.  These  institutions  for  the  exercise  of  the  supreme 
power  are  called  the  government,  and  the  external  ways  and  means 
in  which  the  supreme  powef  is  exercised  are  called  the  form  of  govern- 
ment. '  The  form  of  government  of  a  state  can  therefore  be  estab- 
lished only  through  the  fundamental  laws  (§io). 

In  the  establishment  of  the  fundamental  laws  and  of  the  form  of 
government,  the  fundamental  power  of  the  people  acts  as  law-giver. 
But  when  this  fundamental  power,  according  to  the  standards  of  the 
established  fundamental  laws  and  form  of  government,  makes  over 
the  supreme  power  to  others,  it  acts  not  as  law-giver,  but  as  party 
to  a  contract,  i.  e.,  it  makes  a  contract  [Vertrag]  with  the  assumers  of 
the  supreme  power,  to  the  effect  that  they  will  take  upon  themselves 
and  exercise  the  supreme  power  according  to  the  standards  of  the 
fundamental  law.  The  fundamental  power  of  the  people  can  thus 
not  be  a  judge  over  the  active  supreme  power,  but  all  affairs  and 
controversies  between  them  must  be  adjudicated  according  to  the 
nature  of  the  contract  (§ii).* 

The  supreme  power  of  the  state  consists  in  the  use  of  the  united 
energy  by  a  united  will  (§5).    The  supreme  power  then  amounts 

element  of  his  system.  It  reflects  a  phase  of  reality  which  has  always 
haunted  men's  thinking,  and  which  may  be  counted  on  to  reopen  every 
supposed  closed  system  of  social  philosophy  so  long  as  there  remains 
anything  to  adjust  between  the  individual  and  the  social  factors  in  the 
human  process.  What  happened,  however,  in  Justi's  system,  was  that 
working  necessity  so  completely  outweighed  in  his  judgment  the  claims  of 
popular  sovereignty  in  any  applicable  sense  that  political  absolutism  was 
the  unimpeached  result. 

'  Thus  Justi  identifies  fundamental  laws  {Grundgeseize)  and  gov- 
ernment (Regierung). 

»  Here  Hobbesism  comes  into  the  open  in  contrast  with  the  democ- 
racy of  §9.  How  and  by  whom  adjudicated,  if  njt  l?y  the  fundamental 
power  ?  Justi  avoids  that  question  here,  but  he  has  given  his  practical 
answer  in  the  passage  already  noted  in  the  Staatsvfirthschaft,  viz.,  "The 
king  can  do  no  wrong,"  which  any  other  power  in  the  state  has  a  right 
to  resist.    The  unconscious  humor  of  the  reasoning  is  appealing  when 


JUSTI'S  POLITICAL  PHILOSOPHY  411 

to  the  performance  of  two  great  activities,  viz.,  law-giving  and  the 
execution  of  law.  Hence  the  supreme  power  may  be  divided  into 
two  branches,  each  of  which  may  be  subdivided  (§13).  The  various 
combinations  of  these  subdivisions  give  the  mixed  forms  of  govern- 
ment (§14). 

The  body  thus  formed  has  at  most  only  the  means  [Vermogen] 
of  activity.  To  be  really  active,  it  must  have  a  peculiar  ground  of 
movement  or  activity.  This  can  be  none  other  than  love  of  the  father- 
land or  of  the  form  of  government.  The  ground  of  all  moral  actions 
of  men  is  self-love,  and  the  state,  as  a  moral  body,  can  have  no  other 
ground  of  activity  than  love  for  itself,  or  for  its  essence  and  form. 
This  love,  which  is  so  natural  in  itself,  must  fill  rulers  and  ruled,  and 
thereby  all  parts  of  the  civic  body  will  be  vitalized  (§15)' 

Although  self-love  is  the  ground  of  all  moral  action  of  human 
beings,  yet  this  self-love  requires  very  judicious  guidance  if  human 
beings  are  really  to  attain  happiness.  Man  must  be  virtuous,  and 
live  according  to  the  natural  laws  if  he  wishes  to  be  happy.  Just 
so  the  civic  body  would  fail  to  attain  its  happiness  if  love  for  the 
Fatherland  were  not  judiciously  guided  toward  this  end.    The  mov- 

we  reflect  that  the  "contract"  alleged  is  purely  unilateral.  In  exchange 
for  total  transfer  of  the  citizens'  freedom  to  the  newly  constituted  supreme 
power,  no  quid  pro  quo  is  provided  for  in  the  nature  of  an  enforcible 
obligation  on  the  side  of  this  new  trustee  to  discharge  the  trust  according 
to  the  intention  of  the  alleged  grantors. 

'  In  pointing  out  the  defects  of  Justi's  reasoning  I  am  of  course  not 
blaming  him  for  being  merely  a  reflection  of  his  time.  Blame  and  praise 
are  not  in  question.  The  point  is  to  detect  precisely  the  strength  and 
the  weakness  of  the  methods  of  thinking  of  which  Justi  was  an  exponent. 
The  object  is  always  to  make  use  of  these  discoveries  in  criticism  of  cur- 
rent methods  of  thinking.  We  must  observe,  then,  in  connection  with 
this  paragraph,  that  it  is  a  long  leap  to  a  conclusion  which  is  not  contained 
in  the  previously  adduced  premises.  Between  self-love  and  the  love  of 
the  state  the  minor  premise  is  implied,  as  already  indicated  (Jq,  note), 
that  the  orUy  means  by  which  self-love  can  attain  its  ends  is  through  the 
state  as  traditionally  constituted.  Logically  the  reasoning  is  the  vicious 
circle.  Psychologically,  the  relation  between  self-love  and  love  of  the 
state  is  unanalyzed.  This  latter  is  no  wonder,  as  the  analysis  is  still 
incomplete. 


412  THE  CAMERALISTS 

ing  spring  of  virtue  is  necessary,  and  this  virtue  consists  in  fulfilment 
of  duties  toward  the  state  and  fellow-citizens  (§i6). 

The  form  of  government  is  the  special  nature  of  each  civic  body. 
Each  body  can  move  only  in  accordance  with  its  special  nature. 
Each  form  of  government  requires  its  special  spring  of  action,  e.  g., 
monarchy,  honor;  aristocracy,  moderation;  democracy,  love  for 
equality  (vide  Staatswirtkschajt,  above,  p.  320)  (§17). 

All  forms  of  government  are  equally  good,  so  long  as  they 
preserve  their  ground  of  activity  and  their  springs  of  action  in  full 
strength  (§18). 

If  the  springs  of  action  are  corrupted,  well -organized  mixed 
forms  of  government  are  preferable  (§19). 

Good  organization  of  the  mixed  governmental  forms  depends 
on  a  just  balance  between  the  different  branches  of  the  sovereign 
power  (§20). 

Despotism  is  not  a  special  form  of  government,  but  merely  an 
abuse  (§21). 

Every  state  consists  of  rulers  and  ruled.  This  division  alone  is 
essentia],  and  is  peculiar  to  all  states.  All  other  divisions  are  merely 
accidental.  In  monarchical  states  the^  two  classes  are  ruler  and 
subjects.  In  republics  all  are  subjects  of  the  supreme  power,  but 
not  of  the  j)ersons  at  the  head  of  the  government  (§23).' 

The  people,  which  in  the  democracy  is  everything,  shrinks 
in  importance  in  the  mixed  forms  of  government,  until  in  the  aristoc- 
'  Justi  thus  implies  plainly  enough  the  personal  rulership  of  mon- 
archs.  In  effect  there  was  nothing  in  his  political  philosophy  which 
di£Fered  from  the  Stuart  view  of  divine  right.  Such  passages  as  p.  159, 
in  which  legislation  by  a  representative  body  is  treated  as  best,  do  not 
nullify  this  proposition.  Weighed  against  the  whole  tenor  of  his  system, 
these  flashes  of  modernness  must  be  regarded  as  a  sort  of  mirage,  which 
played  about  the  edges  of  his  theory  but  were  not  actually  assimilated 
with  it.  Justi's  views  of  a  representative  legislature  seem,  moreover, 
to  have  been  not  unlike  those  of  the  present  Czar.  In  1907  the  latter 
allowed  the  third  Douma  to  be  called,  but  he  refused  to  acquiesce  in  its 
declaration  that  he  was  no  longer  an  autocrat.  The  boundaries  which 
Justi  draws  between  the  executive  and  the  legislative  powers  leave  the 
former  still  in  possession  of  a  different  type  of  sovereignty  from  that  which 
today  goes  with  genuine  representative  government  {vide  op.  cit.,  p.  16/). 


JUSTI'S  POLITICAL  PHILOSOPHY  413 

racy  and  the  monarchy  it  is  only  a  very  trifling  something.  Finally, 
through  abuse  of  monarchy  in  tyranny  the  people  and  its  funda- 
mental powers  are  reduced  to  nothing.  The  people  consists  of  think- 
ing beings.  A  thinking  being,  however,  can  never  wholly  and  blindly 
give  over  the  care  for  its  happiness  to  another.  The  people  therefore 
should  in  all  states  be  something  (§27).' 

The  sovereign  power  and  the  people  are  parts  of  a  whole  because 
the  one  necessarily  demands  the  presence  of  the  other,  and  because 
neither  can  exist  without  the  other.  So  soon  therefore  as  the  one 
part  undertakes  anything  which  is  harmful  to  the  other  it  harms  itself 

(§29)' 

The  substance  of  all  duties  of  the  ruler  is  accordingly  to  make 
his  people  happy,  or  to  unite  the  happiness  of  each  several  citizen 
with  the  general  good.  All  duties  of  people  and  subjects  may  be 
reduced  to  the  formula,  to  promote  all  the  ways  and  means  adopted 
by  the  ruler  for  their  happiness  by  their  obedience,  fidelity,  and  diligence 
(§30). 

The  happiness  of  individuals  and  of  the  state  consists  of  freedom, 
internal  strength,  good  conditions,  and  security  (§31). 

Freedom  may  be  separated  into  two  concepts,  political  and 
civic;  or  the  freedom  of  the  state  and  the  freedom  of  the  citizen. 
The  state  is  free  when  it  is  independent,  i.  e.,  when  it  is  neither 
wholly  nor  partially  subject  to  another  state.  The  citizen  is  free 
when  he  can  without  hindrance  realize  his  will.  But  the  citizen  has 
merged  his  will  into  another,  and  this  combined  will  can  express 
itself  only  through  the  laws.  Consequently  the  citizen  is  free  when 
he  suffers  no  other  limitation  of  his  will  than  through  the  laws. 
The  citi7.en  is  therefore  really  free  because  he  is  restrained  by  nothing 
except  rules  for  his  happiness,  rules  to  which  every  free  and  thought- 
ful being  must  subject  himself  (§32). * 

<  Was  Sieybs'  famous  mot  after  all  a  plagiarism  ? 

»  Substitute  for  "sovereign  power"  and  "people,"  "employer"  and 
"employee,"  and  we  have  the  familiar  dictum  of  the  classical  economics 
on  the  absurdity  of  supposed  conflict  of  interests  between  wage  payer  and 
wage  taker. 

3  Justi  omits  his  apologies  to  the  spider  and  the  fly.  The  other 
elements  of  happiness  are  described  in  terms  that  have  already  been 
specified.     Vide  above,  pp.  330,  331. 


414  THE  CAMERALISTS 

A  ruler  must  not  impair  the  reasonable  freedom  of  his  subjects, 
nor  allow  it  to  be  impaired  by  his  favorites  and  servants.  No  one 
in  his  whole  state  must  be  directly  or  indirectly  compelled  to  do  or 
to  forbear  from  doing  anything  which  the  laws,  made  for  the  welfare 
of  the  state,  do  not  prescribe  (§39). 

The  property  of  the  subjects  must  be  the  most  sacred  and  invio- 
lable object  in  the  eyes  of  the  ruler  and  his  servants.  Hence  the  ruler 
may  regard  it  as  his  greatest  glory  if  in  his  private  transactions  the 
subjects  refuse  to  make  over  their  property  to  him.  That  is  always 
the  most  royal  mark  of  the  goodness  of  a  government  (§40).' 

The  ruler  and  his  ministers  should  neither  directly  nor  indirectly 
interfere  with  the  due  process  of  law  (§41). 

Never,  except  in  the  most  extraordinary  need,  should  the  con- 
tributions of  the  subjects  be  increased  (§42). 

No  war  should  be  fought  unless  the  preservation  of  the  state 
makes  it  unavoidable  (§43). 

The  text  is  then  divided  into  five  books,  viz.: 

I.  On  the  ultimate  purpose  of  a  good  government,  and  conse- 
quently the  general  idea  of  a  good  government. 

II.  On  the  fundamental  arrangements  by  means  of  which  gov- 
ernments are  made  good  by  nature. 

III.  On  the  goodness  of  the  government  which  springs  from 
its  own  moderation. 

IV.  On  the  wisdom  of  a  good  government. 

V.  The  errors  and  faults  of  bad  governments. 

It  is  unnecessary  to  go  into  further  details  of  the  argument. 
From  these  generalizations  it  would  be  easy  to  anticipate  the 
substance  of  the  elaboration  of  each  topic.  The  state  which 
Justi  outlines  is  an  organization  of  people  whose  conceded 
legal  and  moral  rights  do  not  include  a  voice  in  making  the 
laws  which  they  must  obey,  and  they  do  not  include  legal  or 
moral  right  to  call  ruler  or  ministers  to  account  if  the  laws 
which  they  decree  are  unjust,  or  if  their  administration  of 
them  is  oppressive.    The  few  further  passages  to  be  cited  will 

•  E.  g.,  the  story  of  Frederick  the  Great  and  the  miller  at  Potsdam. 


JUSTI'S  POLITICAL  PHILOSOPHY  415 

serve  chiefly  to  illustrate  this  proposition.  In  general  the 
fact  is  that  Justi's  ideal  of  the  achievements  of  a  good  state 
was  in  the  main  intelligent,  if  no  account  is  made  of  the  stulti- 
fication involved  in  this  conception  of  the  means  by  which  the 
ideal  was  to  be  attained.  But  in  such  a  case  we  cannot  sepa- 
rate the  end  thus  abruptly  from  the  means.  Freedom  to  do 
our  own  experimenting  with  freedom  is  one  of  the  proximate 
ends  which  thinking  beings  propose  to  themselves  if  their 
thinking  is  not  suppressed;  and  this  freedom  to  find  our  own 
way  to  something  that  may  be  thought  of  as  an  ultimate  freedom 
is  a  more  importunate  aim  than  the  conceivable  ultimate  free- 
dom, if  it  could  be  conferred  by  a  superior  power. 

Justi  lays  down  the  major  premise:  "No  one  can  rule  over 
reasonable  and  free  beings  except  with  the  intention  of  pro- 
moting their  welfare  and  making  them  happy"  (p.  33). 

Of  the  possible  meanings  of  this  sententious  proposition, 
the  substance  of  Justi's  system  forces  us  to  select  this  version, 
viz.,  It  is  impossible  to  suppose  that  a  ruler  would  desire  any- 
thing but  the  best  good  of  his  subjects.  That  is,  it  was  a 
purely  ad  captandum  appeal  for  acquiescence  in  the  prevail- 
ing type  of  absolutism.  With  so  much  granted,  all  the  rest 
of  the  reasoning  is  unanswerable.'  Once  given  an  absolute 
ruler  with  his  existence  justified,  and  no  logic  can  depose  him. 
The  only  refutation  possible  is  through  destruction  of  the 
major  premise;   and  of  course  this  was  the  actual  first  step 

'  I  find  no  evidence  that  there  was  intentional  or  conscious  sophis- 
try in  Justi's  argument.  He  was  apparently  a  convinced  advocate,  at 
least  to  the  extent  that  he  had  not  clearly  thought  out  a  feasible  alterna- 
tive; and  he  was  not  aware  of  weakness  in  his  method  of  proof  {vide  op. 
"^•>  P-  35)f  Whether  his  occasional  praise  of  the  English  system  im- 
peaches his  sincerity  as  an  absolutist,  or  merely  punctuates  the  inco- 
herence of  his  political  philosophy,  is,  to  be  sure,  an  open  question,  but 
on  the  whole,  I  incline  to  the  view  that  these  irreconcilable  elements  in 
his  thinking  show  that  he  had  not  faced  the  necessity  of  adjusting  the 
incompatible  doctrines. 


41 6  THE  CAMERALISTS 

in  abolishing  absolutism  everywhere.  Rulers  being  human 
are  both  intellectually  so  narrow  and  morally  so  fallible  that 
they  are  incapable  in  the  long  run  of  performing  the  function 
which  absolutism  assumes.  Then  another  functionary  and 
another  technique  and  another  philosophy  must  be  substituted. 
Justi  begins  his  detailed  discussion  with  a  proposition 
which  reflects  the  fundamental  political  conception  of  which 
cameralism  was  an  incident;  viz.,  "To  govern  is  to  guide  the 
actions  of  other  people  in  accordance  with  certain  purposes."* 
The  affair  in  which  Justi  was  engaged,  both  as  advocate  and 
as  bureau  official,  was  the  operation  of  a  legislative  and  execu- 
tive organization  conceived  as  something  over  and  above  and 
superior  to  the  people,  although  perforce  in  certain  relations 
of  and  for  the  people.  So  far  as  the  relation  had  been  thought 
out  and  realized,  it  was  not  by  the  people,  and  it  was  for  them 
only  so  far  as  the  persons  who  wielded  the  power  of  the  organi- 
zation were  sufficient  centers  of  light  and  leading  to  use  it 
for  the  real  benefit  of  the  nation  in  a  democratic  sense.  The 
first  and  typical  idea  and  aim  was  to  magnify  the  governing 
power  itself,  and  the  rest  of  the  nation  was  accordingly  rated 
as  tributary  to  that  paramount  purpose.  Justi  proceeds  to 
build  on  his  foundations  of  political  philosophy  after  this 
fashion: 

Those  who  govern  other  men  in  the  unobserved  way,  if  they 
are  rightly  constituted  and  honorable,  will  always  have  as  their 

object  the  best  good  of  those  whom  they  rule If  the  ruled 

discover  that  they  are  controlled  in  another  spirit,  no  matter  how 
simple  they  are,  they  will  sooner  or  later  break  the  fetters.  Invisible 
or  unconscious  government  must  consequently  have  the  best  good 
of  the  people  at  heart;  or,  what  amounts  to  the  same  thing,  it  must 
succeed  in  keeping  the  people  under  the  spell  of  assumption  that  its 
best  good  is  the  foremost  purpose.     We  have  then  to  inquire  what 

'  "  Regieren  heisst  die  Handlungcn  anderer  Menschen  nach  gewissen 
Absichten  Icnken"  (p.  34). 


JUSTI'S  POLITICAL  PHILOSOPHY  417 

must  be  the  ultimate  aims  of  those  who  openly  govern  other  men 
(PP-  35,  36). 

Thereupon  Justi  constructs  an  argument  along  these  specula- 
tive lines;  not  an  induction  of  the  actual  character  of  states 
as  they  are,  not  a  frank  idealization  of  kinds  of  government 
as  he  thought  they  ought  to  be,  not  even  a  modest  inference  as 
to  the  requirements  to  which  governments  must  eventually 
conform.  Instead  of  either  of  these,  he  actually  expatiates 
upon  considerations  partly  of  the  second,  partly  of  the  third, 
t)rpes,  and  then,  as  though  such  considerations  were  pertinent 
evidence,  he  derives  the  basic  inference  that  governments  as 
they  are  conform  to  those  specifications  of  morals  and  long- 
term  expediency,  which  entitle  them  to  the  implicit  acquiescence 
of  subjects.  In  short,  his  major  premise  is  that  actual  gov- 
ernments are  essentially  what  they  would  be  if  the  men  in 
power  were  divinely  good  and  wise.' 

Justi  constantly  appealed  to  religious  sanctions  for  ]:)eliefs 
and  actions.    No  evidence  appears  that  this  was  a  phenomenon 

»  Three  distinct  questions  emerge  here:  first,  Whether  the  policy 
which  this  doctrine  prescribed  was  the  one  best  adapted  to  the  stage  of 
evolution  then  in  progress;  second,  Whether  the  philosophy  expressed 
by  the  doctrine  was  a  valid  generalization;  third,  What  were  the  actual 
effects  of  the  doctrine  upon  the  theories  and  practices  of  the  period  ? 
We  might  answer  the  first  of  these  questions  in  the  affirmative,  as  indeed 
I  am  inclined  to  do,  yet  we  might  most  confidently  answer  the  second 
question  in  the  negative,  and  we  might  find  that  there  were  most  unfor- 
tunate and  confusing  results  to  be  scheduled  in  answer  to  the  third 
question.  Our  present  study  has  no  further  reference  to  the  first  of  tliese 
questions.  We  are  dealing  with  the  second,  principally,  and  uitli  the 
theoretical,  more  than  the  applied,  aspects  of  the  third.  That  is,  we  are 
attempting  to  get  first  a  clear  view  of  Justi's  political  philosophy,  because 
it  was  the  setting  in  which  his  cameralism  has  to  be  interpreted;  and 
we  are  to  use  this  analysis  of  the  principal  and  subordinate  factors  of 
his  system  as  a  guide  to  the  effects  that  the  system,  and  others  of  which 
it  was  a  type,  had  upon  the  course  of  development  in  the  social  sciences 
at  large. 


4i8  THE  CAMERALISTS 

with  deeper  roots  than  mere  acceptance  of  the  conventionalities 
of  his  surroundings,  and  instinctive  perception  that  this  was 
the  type  of  argumentum  ad  hominem  which  would  meet  with 
least  express  opposition.  It  is  accordingly  a  matter  of  course 
that  he  relies  upon  the  claim  that  goodness  will  in  the  long  run 
be  successful,  and  badness  unsuccessful.  Upon  this  ground 
he  urges  that  no  ruler  would  be  so  unwise  as  to  rule  simply 
in  his  own  selfish  interest.  Even  Machiavelli,  he  thinks,  did 
not  teach  that  (p.  36  et  passimy  and  the  worst  tyrants  were 
probably  not  primarily  enemies  of  their  people,  but  they  found 
that  without  intending  to  rouse  their  hostility  they  had  done 
so,  and  thereafter  supposed  themselves  to  be  unsafe  unless  they 
ruled  with  a  high  hand.  This  is  all  a-priori  reasoning,  monarchy 
being  taken  for  granted,  and  the  attempt  being  made  to  show 
that  the  aim  of  monarchy  must  be  the  common  good.  There 
is  no  trace,  even  in  the  last  book  of  the  volume,  which  at 
hasty  glance  might  seem  to  furnish  the  exception,  of  a  genuine 
attempt  to  measure  the  strength  of  this  probability  by  induction. 
In  a  word,  as  Justi  expresses  it,  the  outcome  of  this  a-priori 
reasoning  is,  that  because  it  is  stupid  and  wrong  for  a  ruler 
to  govern  with  selfish  aims,  therefore,  "His  final  purpose  can 
be  no  other  than  to  guide  the  ruled  to  their  best  good,  to  pro- 
note  their  welfare  by  wise  measures — in  a  word,  to  make 
them  happy." 

The  chapter  ends  with  a  homiletical  exhortation  apparently 
intended  both  as  a  play  upon  the  suggestibility  of  the  people 
on  the  one  hand,  and  as  the  most  direct  appeal  jKirmitted  by 
good  form  to  the  better  impulses  of  princes: 

When  a  ruler  in  this  manner  makes  his  subjects  and  at  the  same 
time  himself  happy,  something  grand  is  before  him  in  their  eyes. 
That  is  the  honor,  which  accompanies  all  his  ways  and  the  glory 
which  attends  the  footsteps  of  all  his  actions.  How  beautiful,  how 
lordly,  how  glorious,  how  commendable  is  it  to  govern  men,  when 

•  Justi  thinks  The  Prince  was  a  deeply  veiled  satire.     Vide  p.  327. 


JUSTI'S  POLITICAL  PHILOSOPHY  419 

one  makes  them  happy!  That  is  the  greatest,  the  most  exalted  of 
all  human  activities,  to  which  a  reasoning  being  can  attain,  and  other 
kinds  of  human  honor  and  glory  are  not  to  be  compared  with  it 
(P-  so). 

The  method  of  proving  that  men  united  in  societies  for 
the  sake  of  promoting  their  happiness  is  equally  speculative, 
but  the  more  pertinent  fact  is  that  the  conclusion  did  not  go 
so  far  as  to  justify  the  continuance  of  an  elTectively  tcleological 
attitude  of  subjects  toward  their  governments  after  they  were 
once  formed.  For  practical  purposes  Justi's  philosophy  meant 
that  the  people  must  depend  on  the  government  to  promote 
their  happiness,  but  more  than  that,  they  must  in  the  last 
resort  trust  the  good  intentions  of  the  government  even  when 
it  is  not  apparently  working  in  their  interest.  That  is,  Justi 
posited  absolutism  mitigated  by  laws  which  the  government 
itself  had  made,  by  considerations  of  prudence,  of  religipn, 
of  benevolence,  of  reputation,  each  and  all  to  be  valued  in 
case  of  collision,  not  by  the  people,  but  by  the  ruler. 

This  is  the  typical  confusion  of  ideas  in  the  philosophy 
of  absolutism,  and  especially  in  the  conflict  in  Justi's  mind 
between  tradition  and  a  valid  estimate  of  social  values.  His 
judgment  of  political  ends  reads  almost  like  fundamental 
democracy.  The  limitation  of  his  reasoning  is  found  in  his 
inability  to  accept  the  conclusion  of  social  logic  that  the  histori- 
cally developed  means  of  attaining  human  ends  must,  in  the 
long  run,  command  the  approval  of  the  groups  in  which  they 
function,  or  be  repudiated.  He  could  not  advance  beyond 
the  dogma  that  the  government,  as  constituted,  must  be  accepted 
by  the  pfeople  as  an  automatically  self-correcting  agency,  not 
to  be  interfered  with  by  the  subjects.  That  is,  in  creating 
it  men  acted  as  practical  utilitarians.  In  their  attitude  toward 
it  since  it  has  been  created,  they  must  be  essentially  acquiescent. 
Throughout  Justi's  writings  standards  of  governmental  action 
are  expressed  which  are  prophetic  of  inevitable  change  of 


420  THE  CAMERALISTS 

attitude  toward  governments.  The  crucial  matter  for  his 
views  as  a  political  philosophy,  however,  is  that  these  ideals 
are  scheduled  merely  as  standards  which  it  is  proper  for  the 
people  to  d'^sire,  and  right  and  wise  for  rulers  to  adopt,  but 
not  as  rights  which  citizens  are  free  to  enforce." 

Then  Justi  reiterates  his  generality  that  the  common  happi- 
ness of  the  state  depends  on  "the  three  ideas,  freedom,  inner 
strength,  and  security."  Then  these  ideas  are  expanded  in  a 
way  which  makes  them  quite  compatible  with  the  virtual 
absolutism  previously  assumed  (pp.  65  S.). 

The  discussion  which  follows  (pp.  67-109)  of  the  means 
of  securing  these  three  elements  of  happiness,  is  in  substance 
nearly  identical  with  the  treatment  of  the  same  subject  in 
Staatswirthschaft  and  we  pass  over  all  but  a  few  incidental 
variations. 

For  example,  the  "law  of  parsimony,"  of  which  so  much 
has  been  made  in  later  economic  theory,  is  recognized  in  the 
fundamental  theorems  about  political  means,  viz.,  first,  the 
means  must  correspond  with  the  nature  of  the  thing  to  be 
attained;  second,  of  the  possible  means  they  must  be  the  best; 
third,  they  must  be  the  easiest,  "for  it  is  a  law  of  nature  and 
reason  that  we  do  not  accomplish  a  thing  by  means  of  a  greater 
force,  which  might  be  adequately  brought  about  by  a  lesser" 
(p.  67);  fourth,  they  must  also  be  just,  "for  reason,  justice, 
and  virtue  command  us  not  to  apply  bad  means  for  good  ends." 
"Those  arc  to  be  regarded  as  so  many  fundamental  principles 
of  a  good  government,  by  disregard  of  which  one  will  always 
fall  into  notable  errors"  (p.  68).    Justi  nowhere  contemplates 

'  He  says,  to  be  sure  (p.  64),  "Whatever  is  plainly  opposed  to  the 
ultimate  end  and  nature  of  a  society  can  without  doubt  not  be  binding 
upon  the  society."  In  the  immediate  context,  however,  he  appears  to 
imply  that  this  cannot  be  thought  of  anything  that  occurs  under  the 
regular  forms  of  law.  He  has  elsewhere  expressly  denied  that  sovereignty 
can  at  last  be  in  the  people  as  opposed  to  the  government  {vide  p.  335). 


JUSTI'S  POLITICAL  PHILOSOPHY  421 

any  more  eflfective  sanctions  of  these  virtuous  generalizations 
than  the  conscience  of  the  monarch.  If  he  is  not  so  minded, 
there  is  no  appeal  except  to  the  inscrutable  workings  of  divine 
Providence. 

Another  betrayal  of  the  abortiveness  of  the  conception 
of  freedom  posited  in  Justi's  philosophy  occurs  in  his  elabora- 
tion of  the  concept  in  §85.  He  says:  "Freedom  consists  in 
the  unhindered  exercise  of  his  (the  citizen's)  will.  But  the 
citizens  who  constitute  a  state  have  merged  their  separate 
wills  in  a  single  will.  This  single  will  can  show  itself  in  no 
other  manner  than  through  the  laws."  Thus  freedom  is 
defined  only  in  the  same  breath  to  be  denied.  In  the  state 
which  Justi  contemplated,  freedom  had  only  an  imaginary 
existence.  It  was  a  fi'ction  of  the  philosophy  of  consolation 
applied  as  a  balm  to  the  fefelings  of  subjects  whenever  they 
were  wounded.  The  reality  which  occupied  the  place  of 
freedom  was  just  as  much  tether  for  the  individual  will  as  the 
will  of  the  monarch,  expressed  through  laws  which  he  made, 
saw  fit  to  allow. 

The  light  in  which  the  factor  of  population  was  contem- 
plated in  Justi's  philosophy  appears  in  the  same  context.  It 
was  primarily  a  military  consideration,  and  only  secondarily 
industrial.  That  is,  in  facing  the  prime  problem  of  the  strength 
and  security  of  the  state  against  foreign  aggression,  the  neces- 
sary factors  are  found  to  be,  first,  well  situated  and  fortified 
territory,  and  enough  of  it;  second,  a  sufficient  population 
living  in  such  close  community  that  they  can  act  effectively 
together.    For,  says  Justi  (84) : 

Few  people,  scattered  over  a  wide  territory,  cannot  repulse 
enemies  invading  from  all  directions.  Thus  they  have  much  less 
activity  than  the  same  number  of  people  who  live  closer  together  in 
a  smaller  country.  It  is  easy  to  show  mathematically  how  much 
weaker  a  million  people  are  who  live  scattered  over  a  thousand  square 
miles  than  another  million  occupying  two  hundred  and  fifty  square 


422  THE  CAMERALISTS 

miles,  other  circumstances  being  equal.  It  is  consequently  essen- 
tial to  the  strength  of  the  state  that  its  territory  must  be  peopled 
according  to  the  measure  of  its  greatness.  Accordingly,  the  internal 
strength  of  a  state  depends  upon  the  situation  of  its  territory,  upon 
the  number  of  its  inhabitants,  upon  the  goods  at  its  disposal,  and 
upon  the  talents  and  moral  qualities  of  the  people. 

Enlarging,  two  pages  later  (p.  86),  upon  the  second  of  these 
conditions,  Justi  adds: 

Two  million  people  have  of  course  more  aggregate  energy  and 
strength  than  one  million,  other  things  being  equal. 

The  doctrine  of  population,  taken  in  this  obvious  relation, 
would  seem  to  have  had  much  less  of  the  character  of  a  distinc- 
tive dogma  than  the  commentators  upon  the  history  of  eco- 
nomic theory  have  represented. 

The  same  may  be  said  of  the  factor  of  wealth  in  this  philoso- 
phy of  the  state.  It  was  less  a  dictum  asserting  some  occult 
potency  of  wealth  than  a  matter-of-course  reckoning  upon 
the  obvious.    Thus  Justi  says  (p.  87) : 

The  internal  strength  of  the  state  depends  further  upon  riches  of 
all  sorts  which  are  required  for  the  needs  and  conveniences  of  human 

life Just  as  it  is  beyond  doubt  that  those  states  have  a  much 

more  permanent  ground  for  their  welfare  whose  soil  is  by  nature 
adapted  to  the  production  of  the  necessities  of  life,  so  may  we  also 
assert  that,  other  things  being  equal,  that  state  is  always  the  strongest 
and  happiest  which  has  to  satisfy  the  fewest  needs  from  other  states. 
Such  a  state  is  in  no  way  dependent  upon  other  peoples,  and  it  will 
have  within  itself  all  the  means  which  arc  demanded  for  strength.  A 
good  government  must  therefore  give  its  weightiest  attention  to  the 
production  of  such  riches  and  abundance  of  goods  within  the  country. 

Justi  continues  (p.  88): 

I  have  here  with  great  deliberation  based  the  internal  strength 
of  the  state  ndl  upon  riches  in  gold  and  silver,  and  upon  the  ways 
that  lead  to  such  wealth,  namely,  commerce,  mining,  etc.,  but  entirely 
upon  wealth  in  goods.  This  wealth  in  goods  is  also  alone  the  true 
wealth  of  the  state  which  is  requisite  for  internal  strength.    The 


JUSTI'S  POLITICAL  PHILOSOPHY  423 

Spaniards,  who  imagined  that  they  would  be  the  lords  of  the  whole 
world,  if  they  had  all  the  treasures  of  America  in  their  possession, 
and  for  that  reason  entirely  neglected  wealth  in  goods,  were  in  gross 
error.  With  all  their  treasures  they  have  since  been  the  poorest 
nation  in  Europe,  and  they  could  not  be  anything  else,  since  they 
lacked  the  real  wealth  of  peoples If,  however,  a  state  pos- 
sesses the  real  wealth  in  goods,  and  is  sufficiently  populous,  it  can 
have  all  the  internal  strength  of  which  it  is  capable,  with  neither 
gold  nor  silver  nor  commerce  nor  other  intercourse  with  foreign 
nations,  in  so  far  as  this  isolation  is  compatible  with  its  natural  situa- 
tion, its  circumstances,  and  its  form  of  government Riches 

in  gold  and  silver  is  only  a  relative  wealth  of  the  state,  which  relates 
entirely  to  commerce  and  the  interconnection  with  other  peoples,  and 
is  necessary  merely  on  that  account.  It  belongs  to  the  external 
strength  of  the  state,  and  to  aggressive  power  [Angriff],  but  not  to 
internal  strength  and  defensive  power,  to  which  alone  I  now  refer, 
because  aggression  is  not  to  be  included  in  the  happiness  of  a  state. 
If  a  state  finds  it  in  accordance  with  its  circumstances  and  happiness 
to  have  such  connections  and  intercourse  with  other  nations,  then 
its  internal  strength  will  require  that  it  shall  seek  to  export  as  much 
as  possible  of  its  surplus  in  order  to  increase  its  relative  riches  in  gold 
and  silver.  Under  these  circumstances  that  is  the  strongest  state 
which  has  to  look  to  other  states  for  the  fewest  satisfactions  of  its 
wants,  and  which  exports  the  most  of  its  surplus.* 

In  confirmation  of  the  general  thesis  as  to  the  qualified 
absolutism  which  was  the  ultimate  term  of  Justi's  political 
philosophy,  we  may  quote  from  a  following  section.  Having 
elaborated  the  proposition  that  the  internal  strength  of  a  state 
depends,  first,  on  the  fundamental  virtue  of  obedience  in  the 
subjects,  Justi  continues  (p.  93): 

The  moral  quality  of  rulers,  which  is  demanded  for  the  internal 
strength  of  the  state,  may  be  expressed  in  one  word.    It  is  wisdom. 

'  The  relation  between  cameralism  and  mercantilism  is  reviewed  in 
the  closing  chapter  (pp.  586  ff.).  It  is  enough  to  say  here  that  intimate 
acquaintance  with  the  cameralists  punctures  the  myth  (h&t  their  concep- 
tions of  wealth  were  utterly  bizarre. 


424  THE  CAMERALISTS 

But  this  concept  contains  very  much.  If  rulers  are  wise,  they  are 
everything  necessary  to  make  their  state  strong  and  their  people 
happy.  This  quality,  moreover,  is  so  essential  to  the  strength  of  the 
stace  that  all  previous  means  to  internal  strength  in  the  largest  measure 

lose  their  force,  so  soon  as  wisdom  is  lacking  in  rulers The 

perfection  and  wisdom  of  the  government  is  accordingly  the  chief 
means  and  the  foremost  quality  whereupon  the  true  power  and 
internal  strength  of  the  state  rest.     It  is  the  soul  of  all  previously 

mentioned  means,  and  it  gives  to  them  their  full  effect The 

wisdom  and  perfection  of  a  government,  however,  consists  in  the 
positing  of  a  wisely  chosen  plan  and  programme  of  government,  and 
the  genuine  fundamental  rules:  in  government  by  the  monarch 
himself,  through  his  own  insight,  not  merely  through  his  ministers, 
and  the  concentration  of  all  affairs  in  his  strong  hand;  in  his  wise 
choice  of  ministers  and  servants,  and  assignment  of  each  to  a  post 
of  duty  in  accordance  with  his  qualities  and  capabilities;  in  holding 
all  business  and  affairs  in  the  most  precise  order  and  coherence  and 
the  fighting  forces  in  like  order  and  discipline;  and  finally  in  putting 
the  state  in  the  utmost  possible  condition  of  preparation  against  all 
the  misfortunes  and  accidents  which  must  be  anticipated.  If  a 
state  is  governed  in  this  way,  and  if  it  possesses  at  che  same  time 
the  before-mentioned  means  and  qualities  for  internal  strength, 
it  is  certainly  the  most  perfect  machine  for  exerting  an  uns()eakable 

energy Meanwhile,  although  a  perfectly  wise  and  complete 

government  will  never  exist  in  the  world,  it  is  always  an  indubitable 
truth  that,  of  two  states  which  are  otherwise  completely  equal, 
that  one  will  always  overcome  the  other,  the  government  of  which 
is  most  wisely  and  perfectly  conducted.' 

■The  bathos  of  this  conclusion  is  characteristic  of  the  whole  con- 
ception of  which  the  paragraph  is  an  epitome.  It  involves  the  two  factors 
pointed  out  above:  first,  absolutistic  government  as  the  final  term  in 
civic  relations;  second,  homiletical  moralizing  upon  the  character  that 
rulers  would  have  if  they  knew  their  best  interests,  with  the  implica- 
tion that  actual  rulers  are  enough  like  this  ideal  to  make  obedience 
to  them  the  ultimate  duty  and  recourse  of  citizens.  This  remark 
applies  also  to  the  chapter  (pp.  109-28)  on  "General  Idea  of  a  Good 
Government" 


JUSTI'S  POLITICAL  PHILOSOPHY  425 

In  the  introduction  to  the  second  book,  on  "The  Funda- 
mental Constitution  of  States,  by  Means  of  Which  Govern- 
ments Are  by  Nature  Good,"  Justi  promises  to  sketch  "a  sort 
of  Platonic  republic,  which  to  be  sure  never  will  be  realized. 
Meanwhile  it  is  never  useless  to  know  how  far  human  provision 
can  go  in  a  probable  way  in  the  direction  of  the  goodness  and 
excellence  of  the  government "  (p.  132).  Before  fulfilling  the 
promise  Justi  estimates  in  some  detail  the  merits  and  defects 
of  different  types  of  government  (pp.  132-82).  If  this  passage 
were  read  without  checking  it  up  by  the  rest  of  his  political 
philosophy,  the  conclusion  would  be  necessary  that  he  was 
in  favor  of  a  form  of  government  more  like  that  of  England 
in  the  Victorian  period  than  that  of  the  Stuarts  (p.  175).  It 
would  falsify  the  record  to  explain  away  the  implications  of 
this  chapter.  They  are  plainly  and  rather  unreservedly 
democratic  in  the  modem  sense  with  the  monarchical  element 
retained  as  an  offset  to  democratic  faults  and  inefficiencies. 
If  the  whole  system  were  contained  in  a  compendium  a  thou- 
sand years  old,  the  higher  critics  might  without  remorse  assign 
this  chapter  to  some  interpolator  of  strange  doctrines.  The 
actual  explanation  is  in  harmony  with  traits  which  are  quite 
evident  in  Justi  here  and  there,  particularly  in  the  Staatswirth- 
schaft.  He  allowed  himself  short  flights  of  fancy  which  he 
did  not  take  much  care  to  guard  from  confusion  with  his 
working  technology.  Inasmuch  as  he  opened  the  discussion 
with  the  notification  that  he  would  end  it  with  a  castle  in  the 
air,  it  is  easy  to  infer  that  his  feet  left  the  ground  much  earlier 
than  he  proposed.  He  simply  permitted  himself  to  rhapsodize. 
The  chapter  is  half -conscious  Wahrheit  und  Dichtung  through- 
out. It  is  of  a  piece  with  the  ideal  ethics  which  the  author 
had  previously  held  up  to  rulers  as  a  righteous  standard,  with, 
no  thought  of  winning  for  it  available  political  sanctions.  He 
meant  it,  in  the  unofficial,  irresponsible  compartments  of  his 
mind  which  were  open  to  the  play  of  imagination.    He  was 


426  THE  CAMERALISTS 

sincere  about  these  unassimilated  conceits,  with  a  sort  of 
other-worldly  longing  that  took  refuge  in  them  from  literal 
affairs;  but  as  he  gave  partial  notification  in  the  confession 
above  quoted,  he  did  not  expect  to  be  held  accountable  for 
supposing  that  such  visions  could  ever  be  actualized.  Even 
in  the  course  of  this  excursus,  when  he  is  speaking  of  the  checks 
which  must  be  put  upon  the  different  branches  of  government, 
he  touches  his  familiar  earth  with  the  reservation — 

The  executive  power,  however,  or  the  king,  must,  to  be  sure, 
always  be  so  sacred  and  so  inviolate  that  he  himself  can  never  be 
required  to  render  such  an  account  of  his  acts  (p.  167). 

In  his  summary  Justi  says: 

If  the  legislative,  executive,  and  judicial  powers  in  the  funda- 
mental constitution  of  a  mixed  governmental  form  are  so  ordered, 
as  above  pictured,  we  may  declare  that  the  government  is  good  in 
its  nature.  The  king  has  all  power  which  is  requisite  for  execution, 
and  on  reasonable  grounds  he  can  demand  no  more.  In  all  external 
affairs  of  state  he  has  completely  free  hands,  and  nothing  hinders 
him  from  taking  the  resolves  and  measures  which  he  regards  as  neces- 
sary for  the  true  welfare  of  his  state.  Since  in  matters  of  execution 
he  is  not  bound  to  obtain  the  consent  of  anyone,  he  can  give  to  all 
his  undertakings  the  utmost  swiftness,  vigor,  and  efficiency,  and 
it  is  his  own  affair  if  his  intentions  and  measures  do  not  remain 
secret.  In  short  he  has  all  power  to  do  good,  but  no  power  at  all 
to  do  evil  (p.  173). 

Coming  to  the  avowedly  Utopian  part  of  his  discussion, 
he  begins  as  follows  (p.  183): 

Is  then  a  governmental  form  possible,  in  which  no  errors  and 
imperfections  would  inhere,  but  which  by  virtue  of  the  excellence  of 
its  fundamental  constitution  would  represent  a  type  of  government 
which  by  its  very  nature  would  be  always  and  completely  good? 
If  the  question  were  to  be  taken  in  all  its  severity  we  should  be  obliged 
to  answer  without  reserve  in  the  negative.  People  themselves  are 
subject  to  a  thousand  limitations  and  weaknesses.  All  their  actions 
are  led  by  their  passions,  and  all  too  often  do  these  passions  raise  a 


JUSTI'S  POLITICAL  PHILOSOPHY  427 

storm  which  drives  the  wisest  and  best  men  hither  and  thither  like 
so  much  chaff.  How  is  it  to  be  expected,  then,  that  people  can  erect 
a  mode  of  government  which  in  the  strict  sense  would  be  completely 
perfect  ?  It  is  people  who  erect  governments,  and  who  are  governed. 
They  are  the  stuff  for  the  whole  work.  How  can  a  highly  perfect 
work  be  composed  of  such  meager  and  feeble  material  ?  If,  however, 
we  understand  by  the  question,  whether  a  form  of  government  is 
possible  which  is  freed  from  all  the  major  mistakes  and  failures 
which  we  so  often  find  in  civic  institutions,  a  form  which  can  assure 
to  citizens  all  the  security,  freedom,  and  happiness  to  which  by 
means  of  their  weak  nature  they  can  ever  attain,  and  which  at  the 
same  time  possesses  all  the  strength  and  permanence  against  con- 
tingencies within  and  without  of  which  a  state  is  capable,  then  we 
must  answer.  Yes.  We  said  above  that  we  would  construct  a  sort 
of  Platonic  republic,  which  it  would  be  ridiculous  to  expect  to  realize 
in  the  present  condition  of  realms  and  states.  Nevertheless,  we  hope 
to  give  our  proposal  such  a  form  that  fewer  faults  can  be  found  with 
it  than  with  such  idealistic  structures  in  the  past. 

Reducing  Justi's  fantasy  to  the  lowest  terms,  it  is  as  follows 
(pp.  184-207): 

I.  We  must  take  men  as  they  are,  with  all  their  desires  and 
passions.  Accordingly,  when  a  reasonable  and  moral  people,  living 
by  the  side  of  similar  peoples,  wishes  to  choose  a  constitucion,  it 
must  base  its  plan  on  the  existence  of  these  desires  and  passions. 
They  must  be  reckoned  upon  in  the  plan  as  the  means  of  making 
the  structure  of  the  state  strong  and  durable.  If  we  except  love, 
which  is  rather  a  natural  impulse  than  a  passion,  the  strongest  among 
all  human  passions  is  the  desire  for  prestige  [Forsj^f],  or  the  passion 
for  honor  and  glory.'  Nothing  is  so  natural  to  man  as  this  passion. 
The  impulse  which  the  wise  Originator  of  nature  implanted  in  every 
man,  to  hold  his  own  being  most  precious,  in  order  that  he  might 

'  This  passage  then  is  of  more  than  curious  significance  merely 
as  presenting  a  Utopia.  It  is  a  first-rate  piece  of  evidence  on  our  funda- 
mental theorem  that  Just!  had  not  focalized  the  economic  interest  proper. 
He  had  not  heard  of  "  the  economic  man."  His  fundamental  assumption 
was  the  personally  ambitious  man. 


428  THE  CAMERALISTS 

take  pleasure  in  maintaining  himself  and  in  fulfilling  the  designs  of 
the  Creator,  is  that  which  brings  forth  the  longing  for  prestige. 
Consequently  this  is  the  passion  of  which  chief  use  will  be  made  in 
a  wise  design  for  a  civic  constitution  (p.  184). 

2.  Yet  we  must  seek  to  establish  and  maintain  virtue.  All 
passions  may  be  evil  as  well  as  good,  in  the  degree  in  which  they 
are  guided  and  governed;  and  when  they  are  left  to  themselves  they 
always  tend  rather  to  bad  than  to  good.  The  desire  for  prestige 
needs  therefore  another  moving  spring,  whereby  it  is  guided  and, 
as  it  were,  geared,  in  order  that  it  may  be  held  back  from  excesses. 
This  second  moving  spring  is  virtue  (p.  185). 

3.  A  mixed  form  of  govenment,  composed  partly  of  aristocracy 
and  partly  of  democracy,  would  serve  best  in  employing  these  two 
motive  springs  in  all  their  strength.  I  see  no  probability  that  virtue 
would  be  preserved  in  a  form  composed  of  king  and  democracy. 
I  would  therefore  forego  the  efficiency  of  a  monarchy  for  the  virtue 
of  a  republic.  To  be  sure,  Sparta  had  kings,  and  virtue  was  per- 
fectly maintained  there.  But  our  times  are  so  different  from  those 
of  the  Spartan  republic,  that  we  could  not  think  of  such  a  thing  as 
subjecting  the  king  to  the  judicial  judgment  of  che  people,  and  his 
morals  and  management  to  the  guardians  of  the  state.  Our  times 
are  so  accustomed  to  combining  with  the  royal  dignity  great  outward 
splendor  and  display,  that  a  king  without  this  frivolous,  to  be  sure, 
yet,  on  account  of  prejudice,  necessary  glitter,  would  be  the  laughing- 
stock of  all  his  neighbors.  It  will,  however,  never  be  possible  to 
banish  vice  from  a  state  if  it  contains  that  degree  of  luxury  which 
so  closely  borders  on  vice,  if  the  king  and  his  court  are  not  subject 
to  the  institutions  of  the  state  for  the  maintenance  of  virtue  (p.  187).* 

4.  It  is  non-essential  what  marks  of  distinction  a  government 
adopts  to  stimulate  the  desire  for  prestige,  so  long  as  sufficient  skill 
is  used  to  create  a  prejudice  in  their  favor.    To  this  end  three  means 

'  What  business  Justi  has  to  embarrass  a  Utopia  by  consideration 
either  of  Spartan  times  or  of  "our  times,"  it  would  be  cruel  to  ask.  He 
was  evidently  not  aware  that  he  was  trying  to  stand  with  one  foot  in  the 
clouds  and  one  on  the  earth.  This  attempt  at  a  free  flight  of  fancy  only 
brings  out  more  clearly  his  conviction  that  for  mundane  purposes  the 
quasi-absolute  kings  of  his  experience  were  necessary. 


JUSTI'S  POLITICAL  PHILOSOPHY  429 

must  be  adopted:  (i)  the  symbols  of  honor  must  be  publicly  bestowed; 
(2)  they  must  be  given  for  actual  merit  only ;  (3)  they  must  not  be 
made  too  common.  Under  these  conditions  a  laurel  wreath  is  as 
effective  as  a  golden  crown  bestudded  with  gems.  The  reason  why 
our  times  show  so  few  heroic  deeds  is  that  our  marks  of  distinction 
are  not  bestowed  according  to  these  specifications  (p.  188).' 

5.  Nobility  should  not  be  hereditary,  and  being  obtained  for 
life  only  it  will  be  a  powerful  spur  to  virtue  (p.  190). 

6.  Virtue  must  be  maintained  by  laws  and  morals  which  are 
identical,  and  there  must  be  a  moral  censorship  [Siltenrichter]. 
This  college  must  consist  of  the  most  eminent,  virtuous,  and  honor- 
able men  in  the  state,  and  the  members  must  have  a  right  of  veto 
upon  an  election  by  the  people  to  a  vacancy  in  the  college  in  case  they 
know  anything  to  the  discredit  of  the  person  proposed.  These 
censors  must  not  have  the  slightest  connection  with  the  government. 
They  must  be  the  protectors  of  the  fundamental  constitution  of  the 
state,  the  defenders  of  the  laws,  the  maintainers  of  virtue  and  good 
morals,  the  promoters  of  skill,  of  the  arts,  and  of  science.  In  all 
these  particulars  they  must  have  a  quite  unlimited  power  subject  to 
the  fundamental  laws,  a  power  which  should  extend  indeed  over  all 
the  administrative  colleges  of  the  state,  and  even  over  the  represent- 
ative of  the  people.  They  must  have  power  to  suspend  or  depose 
and  imprison  any  member  of  the  government  who  is  guilty  of  treason- 
able or  corrupting  practices.  There  must  be  in  front  of  the  place 
of  assemblage  of  this  college  a  receptacle  in  which  citizens  could 
deposit  testimony  about  anything  of  which  the  censors  should  be 
informed  (p.  191), 

7.  In  the  form  of  government  which  I  here  propose  no  one  has 
a  peculiar  interest  in  the  welfare  of  the  whole  people.  It  is  therefore 
not  necessary  that  the  people  should  possess  law -giving  power. 
The  power  of  the  people  is  never  free  from  deficiencies  and  faults. 
The  people  [7o/*],  however,  which  has  (sic)  little  capacity  for  gov- 
erning, is  excellently  endowed  for  selecting  those  who  may  be  charged 
with  governing.     I  consequently  propose  that  the  whole  work  of 

»  As  our  plan  is  to  exhibit  Justi's  system  objectively,  as  an  attempt 
at  social  science,  rati  er  than  to  examine  its  psychological  presuppositions, 
it  is  needless  to  comment  on  this  naive  mental  philosophy. 


430  THE  CAMERALISTS 

government,  both  law-giving  and  execution,  should  be  reserved  for 
the  [x;rsonal  nobility,  and  that  the  people  should  have  no  part  in 
governing  beyond  election  of  the  officials  (p.  194). 

8.  The  common  raVjble  should  not  be  allowed  to  take  part  in' 
elections.  Klcctoral  right  should  be  based  upon  the  rates  paid  to 
the  public  treasuf}-.  The  man  who  pays  20  Thaler  yearly  should 
have  one  vote;  he  who  pays  100  Thaler  yearly  should  have  two 
votes,  anrl  for  each  additional  icx?  Thaler  there  should  be  one  vote. 
This  would  not  only  be  just  in  itself,  but  it  would  bring  about  a  more 
willing  payment  of  the  rates.  The  personal  nobility,  as  the  only 
class  eligible  for  e'ection,  would  not  be  permitted  to  vote,  because 
of  their  self-interest.  In  large  states  a  representative  system  of  elec- 
tion must  Ik-  adopted  (p.  196). 

9.  The  number  of  the  nobility  should  be  one  hundred  and  fifty 
in  small  states,  three  hundred  in  medium  states,  and  six  hundred 
'n  large  states.  Each  of  these  should  receive  from  the  state  an 
annual  allowance  of  three  hundred  to  six  hundred  Reichsthaler 
(p.   200). 

10.  The  officials  should  be  divided  in  the  first  place  into  three 
chief  colleges:  (a)  for  law-giving,  (h)  for  execution,  (c)  for  judicial 
functions.  Mcml)ers  should  l>e  divided  into  three  classes,  one  class 
retiring  from  office  each  year  (p.  200). 

11.  There  should  l>e  in  addition  as  many  other  colleges  as  are 
at  present  customarv'  in  European  states,  but  they  should  be  subor- 
dinate to  the  three  principal  colleges  (p.  201). 

12.  In  case  of  disagreement  between  the  three  chief  colleges 
which  cannot  be  arranged  by  conferences  within  thirty  days,  it  shall  be 
the  duty  of  the  chairman  of  the  colleges,  on  pain  of  banishment, 
to  lay  the  matter  Ixfore  the  college  of  censors.  The  latter  must 
then  summon  the  whole  Unly  of  the  nobility  to  investigate  the 
difficulty  and  to  decide  it  by  majority  vote.  The  contending  col- 
leges must  adopt  the  decision  at  once,  for  the  total  nobility  is  the 
lx)dy  in  which  the  unlimited  power  should  reside,  although  it  does 
not  exercise  it  except  in  an  extremity.  Even  then  it  must  sometimes 
proceed  by  chfK)sing  from  its  own  numl^>er  a  dictator,  who  for  a  short 
perio<]  should  unite  in  his  own  jxjrson  all  might  and  power,  in  order 
to  save  the  republic  from  threatened  destruction  (p.  202). 


JUSTI'S  POLITICAL  PHILOSOPHY  43 1 

13.  Universal  liability  to  military  service  for  a  term  of  six  years 
would  be  necessary  (p.  204). 

It  is  not  worth  while  to  analyze  the  implications  of  this 
conceit,  as  Justi  himself  a  third  time  (p.  206)  reminds  his 
readers  that  it  is  aside  from  the  serious  purpose  of  his  book. 
Even  the  specifications  of  this  Utopia,  however,  serve  to 
emphasize  the  literal  preconceptions  of  Justi's  working  philoso- 
phy. It  was  in  the  first  place  a  presumption  of  static  order 
in  the  state;  second,  a  reliance  upon  some  institutional  abso- 
lute; third,  an  overestimate  of  the  relative  importance  of  civic 
structure  in  the  whole  economy  of  life. 

Passing  to  Book  III,  "On  the  Goodness  of  the  Government 
Due  to  Its  Own  Moderation,"  Justi  begins  with  the  proposition 
that  if  we  cannot  have  such  "governments  good  by  nature," 
the  only  hope  of  good  government  is  in  the  self-enforced 
moderation  of  such  governments  as  actually  exist,  "for  every 
unlimited  and  great  power  is  by  its  very  nature  terrible,  and 
it  has  harmful  effects  on  the  subjects  (p.  211). 

In  dealing  with  a  body  of  thought  which  from  our  modern 
point  of  view  is  so  crowded  with  half-developed  and  arbitrarily 
correlated  ideas,  there  is  always  danger  of  making  the  anoma- 
lies more  extreme  than  they  were.  No  other  interpretation 
can  be  put  on  this  section,  however,  than  the  following:  first, 
we  must  in  practice  lake  for  granlcd  the  absolutism  of  govern- 
ment; second,  "a  govcrnnuni  uliiih  h;is  unlimited  power  in  its 
hands,  and  can  use  that  iM»u(r  a<  ii  |»li'as«,'s,  can  never  be  good 
unless  it  moderates  this  power  by  its  own  iniiiative"  (p.  211). 
In  other  words,  this  is  the  literal  formulation  of  the  fundamen- 
tal political  conception  which  is  known  by  ihe  proverbial 
phrase  "benevolent  despotism."  This  formula  expresses 
the  cameralistic  conception,  as  the  legend,  rstat  c'est  moi,- 
symbolizes  the  ancien  rigime  in  France.  Justi  assumes  that 
the  world  being  what  it  is,  an  absolutism  embodied  in  a  king 
is  a  necessity.    Yet  many  things  go  to  make  up  that  other 


432  THE  CAMERALISTS 

conception,  "happiness,"  which  royal  absolutism  might  easilj 
frustrate.  This  philosophy  does  not  thereupon  reconsider 
its  conclusion  that  political  absolutism  is  necessary.  It  leaves 
"happiness"  at  the  mercy dof  absolutism,  with  the  hope  that 
the  absolute  monarch  actually  will  be  merciful.  The  present 
section  then  is  virtually  a  series  of  memoranda  from  the  side 
of  "happiness,"  calling  the  attention  of  absolute  monarchs 
to  points  which  they  will  observe  if  they  want  their  rule  to 
result  in  the  largest  output  of  advantage  for  the  state,  in  dis- 
tinction from  their  own  absolutism. 

In  other  words,  this  political  philosophy  started  with  the  lame 
and  impotent  assumption  that  it  is  desirable  for  absolutism  to 
be  good,  rather  than  the  assumption  that  absolutism  is  not  a 
good.  Then  it  proceeded  along  the  cautious  path  of  specify- 
ing how  an  absolutism  would  conduct  itself  if  it  were  good. 
If  we  were  immediately  engaged  in  tracing  the  course  of 
political  evolution,  we  should  have  here  an  important  clue  to 
the  process.  Even  these  dutiful  reminders  had  a  cumulative 
force.  Sj)ecifications  of  happiness  presently  came  to  have 
another  logical  value.  The  inference  drawn  was  no  longer 
that  it  is  desirable  for  the  absolute  government  to  promote  these 
things,  but  that  an  absolute  government  is  intolerable  because 
it  can  jeopardize  these  things.  This  is  the  gist  of  the  whole 
matter  involved  in  this  part  of  Justi's  argument,  and  we  shall 
notice  only  one  or  two  details. 

The  first  chapter  of  Book  III  is  dedicated  to  proof  of  the 
proposition  that  "unlimited  and  great  power  is  in  its  nature 
terrible  and  dangerous."  It  takes  as  its  point  of  departure 
the  theorem:  "Every  man  is  inclined  to  misuse  his  power" 
(p.  212).  The  moralizings  and  mental  philosophizings  which 
form  the  medium  of  the  discussion  need  not  be  called  to  account. 
For  our  purposes  it  is  enough  to  set  down  the  specifications 
of  danger  which  Justi  discovered.  In  the  first  place,  he  con- 
cluded that  even  virtuous  men  who  are  able  to  extend  their 


JUSTI'S  POLITICAL  PHILOSOPHY  433 

power  fall  into  the  way  of  thinking  that  such  extension  of 
power  is  good  in  itself,  regardless  of  consequences  to  others. 
As  Montesquieu  says,  "Even  virtue  needs  limitations"  (p.  213). 
Great  power  tends  to  become  arbitrary  power  (p.  214).  Hence 
such  power  is  always  to  be  feared  (p.  215),  The  outcome  of 
arbitrary  exercise  of  power  is  despotism  in  which  the  mere 
will  of  the  ruler  is  the  highest  law  (p.  215).  The  whole  power 
of  the  state  in  the  hands  of  one  person  is  in  itself  to  be  feared, 
apart  from  its  resting  upon  the  will  of  the  ruler  alone  (p.  216). 
Platitudes  are  Justi's  specialty,  but  he  seldom  puts  it  on  exhibit 
more  plainly  than  at  this  point. 

The  same  level  of  bathos  is  maintained  in  the  following 
chapter  "On  the  Moderation  and  Fixing  of  the  Will  Whereby 
an  Unlimited  Government  Becomes  Good."  It  consists  of 
such  "copy-book  commonplaces"  as  these: 

The  misuse  of  unlimited  power  which  is  so  harmful  to  the  state 
consists  in  the  exercise  of  the  will  of  the  ruler  according  to  his  pleas- 
ure and  caprice  (p.  222);  hence  a  good  unlimited  government  must 
have  two  chief  qualities:  (a)  its  will  must  be  moderated,  (b)  its  will 
must  be  constant  (p.  223);  the  proper  moderation  of  the  will  of  an 
unlimited  government  is  through  the  guidance  of  reason,  which  has 
no  other  aim  than  the  best  good  of  the  state  (p  223);  a  good  ruler 
must  clearly  distinguish  his  personal  will  from  his  will  as  a  ruler 
(p.  224);  even  if  convinced  that  his  personal  will  is  a  good  will,  a 
wise  ruler  will  not  try  to  make  it  his  governmental  will;  e.  g.,  he  will 
not  try  to  impose  his  religion  upon  his  subjects  (p.  226);  constancy 
of  will  in  the  government  is  necessary  to  prevent  uncertainty  among 
the  governed  (pp.  227-32). 

In  the  same  general  tone  Justi  proceeds,  in  chap,  iii,  to 
schedule  "the  fundamental  principles  and  rules  of  a  good 
government."    These  turn  out  to  be: 

The  first  and  chief  principle  of  a  good  government  is  unques- 
tioaably  that  of  benevolence  and  moderation  [Gelindigkeit]  (p.  233) ; 
(a)  Since  it  is  the  aim  and  duty  of  a  good  government  to  make  the 


434  THE  CAMERALISTS 

people  happy,  one  of  its  chief  principles  must  be  to  make  the  people 
rich  (p.  237);'  (3)  General  diffusion  of  wealth,  rather  than  its 
concentration  in  a  few  hands,  is  to  be  promoted  (p.  239) ;  (4)  Fraud 
and  treachery  as  devices  of  statecraft  are  to  be  rejected  on  grounds 
both  of  morals  and  of  utility  (p.  241);'  (5)  Cunning  not  involving 
treachery  may  \)e  used  fp.  242);  (6)  "A  good  government  will 
observe  five  fundamental  rules:  (a)  To  assure  the  subjects  a  rea- 
sonable freedom,  (b)  To  regard  their  property  as  inviolable,  (c)  To 
withhold  its  hands  from  interference  with  justice,  (d)  Not  to  increase 
the  imposts,  (e)  Except  in  actual  necessity  not  to  declare  war  (p.  243). 

■  For  its  value  as  evidence  in  another  connection  the  context  is  worth 
translating,  viz.,  "We  understand  here  riches  in  all  sorts  of  goods  which 
are  based  chiefly  on  a  flourishing  sustaining  system  [Nahrungsstand], 
and  without  the  same  no  people  can  properly  be  thought  of  as  happy. 
....  Today  there  is  no  doubt  about  this  principle.  If  a  corrupted 
statecraft  once  believed  that  the  wealth  of  the  subjects  must  be  hindered 
in  order  not  to  feed  the  spirit  of  uproar,  or  at  least  of  opposition  to  the 
supreme  power,  we  have  today  gone  beyond  that  petty  principle.  We 
have  found  that  an  impoverished  f>eople,  which  has  nothing  to  lose,  is 
much  more  inclined  to  disorder  than  well-to-do  citizens,  and  the  credit 
[A  nsehen]  of  the  supreme  power  is  today  so  well  established  by  reasonable 
rules  of  government,  and  by  standing  armies,  that  there  is  little  to  fear 

from  subjects  in  this  resj)ect There  can  be  no  doubt  that  the 

riches  and  welfare  of  the  subjects  should  be  the  main  purpose,  and  the 
consequent  power  and  strength  of  princes  the  subsidiary  purpose,  and 
not  the  reverse."  (This  last  proposition  is  a  plain  negation  of  my  fun- 
damental theorem  aVxtut  cameralism.  My  justification  throughout  is 
appeal  to  the  whole  system  against  its  parts.  I  ref>eat  that  we  must  not 
force  upon  inconsistent  elements  a  coherent  unity  which  did  not  exist. 
Judged  by  the  rest  of  the  system  as  contained  in  Justi's  books  and  in  the 
workings  of  the  typ>e  of  government  which  they  formulated,  the  proposi- 
tion quoted  must  be  taken,  along  with  the  other  idealistic  elements,  as 
a  symptom  of  partially  assimilated  insight,  which  would  presently  give 
both  to  social  science  and  to  governmental  pxjlicy  a  changed  perspective.) 

*  Justi  compares  his  own  with  earlier  times  in  this  respect  in  terms 
which,  taken  literally,  claimed  that  this  theorem  was  the  contemporary 
working  rule.  Here  again  was  an  uncritical  mixture  of  relative  truth 
and  of  sheer  assertion  of  ideal  value.  The  latter  is  demonstrated  by 
the  admission  which  Justi  makes  at  the  close  of  the  paragraph  (p.  242). 


JUSTI'S  POLITICAL  PHILOSOPHY  435 

The  fourth  chapter  of  the  book,  on  the  restraint  which  a 
good  government  should  exercise  in  the  matter  of  expense, 
is  merely  a  variation  of  commonplaces  which  governments 
of  the  type  that  he  had  in  mind  observed  or  not,  according 
to  the  temper  of  their  rulers. 

Book  IV,  "On  the  Wisdom  of  a  Good  Government,"  is 
a  very  slight  variation  upon  corresponding  passages  in  Staats- 
wirthschaft.  It  contains  nothing  which  in  principle  modifies 
our  previously  expressed  estimate  of  Justi's  political  philosophy. 
As  we  intimated  above,*  Justi's  confessed  knowledge  of  abuses 
in  actual  operation  did  not  lead  him  to  the  conclusion  which 
has  since  become  self-evident,  viz.,  that  the  quasi-absolutism 
of  the  eighteenth  century  was  an  intolerable  anachronism. 
In  the  last  book,  Justi  catalogues  enough  faults  of  that  type 
of  government  to  condemn  it  without  remorse,  but  his  expressed 
inferences  amount  only  to  the  impotent  reflection  that  rulers 
who  permit  such  abuses  ought  to  be  ashamed  of  themselves, 
and  God  probably  has  in  reserve  for  them  such  averted  glances 
as  are  thinkable  in  the  case  of  his  anointed.  It  would  be 
profitless  to  rehearse  specifications  of  delinquencies  which 
had  no  further  meaning  for  human  programmes. 

»  E.  g.,  pp.  406  £f.  et  passvni. 


CHAPTER  XVI 
JUSTI'S  "  POLICE YWISSENSCHAFT" 

We  now  come  to  the  most  peculiar  division  of  cameralistic 
theory,  the  portion  which,  next  to  the  fundamental  absolutistic 
political  philosophy,  contains  most  that  is  antithetic  with 
English  and  American  theory  and  practice.  In  order  to  repre- 
sent it  most  vividly  we  shall  digest  Justi's  treatment,  translating 
as  nearly  as  possible  his  own  words.  This  will  involve  not  a 
little  repetition.  We  cannot  fairly  represent  Justi,  however, 
without  reporting  some  of  his  self -iteration.  We  deal  first 
with  Gfundsatze  der  PoUceywissenschaft.^ 

The  Preface  to  the  first  edition  of  this  book  is  dated,  Gottin- 
gen,  May  ii,  1756.  A  second  edition  appeared  in  1759. 
Beckmann  says  the  book  had  been  used  by  various  eminent 
teachers  as  the  basis  of  their  lectures  on  the  subject. 
Meanwhile,  several  such  introductions  had  appeared.  The 
editor  refers  to  Justi's  disregard  of  other  writers,'  and  promises 
to  do  his  best  in  the  notes  to  supply  the  gaps.  In  his  own 
Preface  to  the  first  edition  (reprinted  in  the  third)  Justi  discusses 
the  literature  of  the  subject,  and  in  order  to  show  the  state  of 
his  information  and  opinions  about  other  theorists  his  remarks 
must  be  cited.    In  substance  he  says: 

I  Johann  Heinrich  GoUlobs  von  Justi,  ehemaligen  Konigl.  Gross- 
hrUannischen  und  Braunschweig-Lunebergischen  Chur/ursU.  Berg-Roths, 
und  Ober-Policey-Commissarii,  wie  auch  Mitgliedes  der  Konigl.  Socie- 
ty der  Wissensckaften  in  GdUingen,  Grundsdtxe  der  Policeywissenschaft, 
in  einen  verniinftigen,  auf  den  Endtweck  der  Policey  gegriindeten,  Zusam- 
mtnhange,  und  sum  Gebrauche  academischer  Vorlesungen  abgefasset. 
Dritte  Ausgabe,  mit  Verbesserungen  und  Anmerkungen  von  Johann  Beck- 
mann, ordentlichem  Professor  der  Oekonomie  in  GdUingen  ....  178a. 
All  references  are  to  this  third  edition. 

*  Vide  above,  p.  292  e/  passim. 

436 


JUSTI'S  "POLICEYWISSENSCHAFT"  437 

This  book  is  the  first  instalment  of  the  promise  to  write  text- 
books on  each  of  the  cameralistic  sciences.  It  is  the  outline  of  a 
course  to  occupy  one  semester.  It  is  the  first  complete  treatment 
of  Policeywissenschaft.  The  common  error  has  been  to  boil  this 
subject  in  one  broth  with  Slaatskunst.  We  have  a  countless  number 
[eine  unbeschreibliche  Menge]  of  books  which  contain  the  elements 
of  Slaatskunst,  but  they  do  not  assort  their  material.  Staatskunst 
has  nothing  for  its  purpose  but  the  internal  and  external  security 
of  the  state,  and  its  chief  attention  must  be  given  to  the  conduct  of 
states  toward  each  other,  to  increase  of  the  power  of  the  state  in 
relation  to  other  states,  and  especially  to  wise  conduct  toward 
other  states.  In  like  manner  Staatskunst  is  concerned,  on  the  other 
hand,  with  adjusting  the  conduct  of  subjects  toward  one  another 
and  toward  other  states. 

Policeyvdssenschaft,  on  the  contrary,  is  concerned  with  nothing 
but  the  preservation  and  increase  of  the  total  "means"  [Vermogen] 
of  the  state  through  good  internal  institutions  [Verfassungen]  and 
with  creating  all  sorts  of  internal  power  and  strength  for  the  republic: 
e.  g.,  through  (i)  cultivating  the  land;  (a)  improving  the  laboring 
class;  (3)  maintaining  good  discipline  and  order  in  the  community. 
In  the  last  task  it  is  the  tool  of  Staatskunst  in  maintaining  inner 
security. 

Other  books  have  treated  Pciicey  in  connection  with  principles 
of  Cameral-  oder  Fimanz-Wissenschaft,  to  the  disadvantage  of  each 
science,  thou^  they  are  neariy  related.  Policey  is  the  ground  (sic) 
of  genuine  cameral  science,  and  the  police  expert  must  sow  if  the 
cameralist  is  to  reap;  yet  each  science  has  its  fixed  and  indisputable 
boundaries.  The  one  seeks  to  increase  the  total  "means."  The 
other  seeks  to  get  from  this  the  "readiest  means,"  without  harm 
to  the  formen 

In  other  books,  Policey  is  treated  along  with  Oekommie;  e.  g., 
Zink,*  both  in  his  Grundriss  and  in  his  Anfangs-Griimde,  starts  with 
certain  general  principles  of  Oeconomie,  and  then  of  Policey,  and 
then  treats  of  more  special  economic  questions  first  from  the  eco- 
nomic, second  from  the  police  standpoint.    This  leads  to  constant 

>  I  have  not  observed  an  instance  in  which  Justi  follows  his  contem- 
ptxmiy's  spelling  of  the  name. 


438  THE  CAMERALISTS 

repetitions.  Moreover,  Policey  cannot  be  completely  treated  in  this 
way,  because  it  has  a  much  wider  scope  than  economic  subjects. 
In  his  Anjangs-Griinde,  which  is  very  diffuse,'  Zink  either  wholly 
forgets  many  important  police  subjects,  or  gives  them  only  a  few 
lines. 

The  late  Herr  Canzler  von  Wolff  wrote  a  large  number  of  books,' 
and  as,  according  to  his  profession,  he  wanted  to  be  a  system-writer 
of  all  sciences,  it  was  to  be  expected  that  he  would  write  a  Policey. 
But  the  social  life  of  human  beings  was  the  mistaken  chief  subject 
of  his  work,  which  did  not  fit  into  the  proper  boundaries  of  the  sci- 
ences. His  book  therefore  contains  many  valuable  teachings  about 
Policey,  but  consistently  with  his  ultimate  purpose  he  mixed  them 
with  so  many  principles  of  moral  philosophy  [Sittenlehre],  of  the  law 
of  nature,  and  of  prudence  [Lebensweisheit],  in  general,  that  the  work 
is  of  no  use  as  a  system  of  Policey.  Sciences  must  be  separated  from 
each  other  to  be  complete,  because  many  useful  doctrines  will  be 
overlooked  if  they  are  treated  together. 

Of  the  few  books  that  remain  on  Policey  proper,  we  name  none 
until  the  present  (eighteenth)  century.  There  has  been,  until  late 
years,  no  adequate  idea  of  Policey,  as  is  proved  by  such  examples  as 
Boter,  Griindlicher  Bericht  von  Anordnung  guter  Policey,  Strassburg, 
1696;  Schrammer,  Politia  historica,  Leipzig,  1605;  Reinking, 
Bibliche  Policey;  etc. 

Others  in  this  century  have  a  correct  idea  of  Policeywissenschaft 
but  are  not  at  all  complete:  e.  g.,  Law,  Entwurf  einer  wohleingerich- 
teten  Policey.  The  author  was  not  equal  to  his  vmdertaking.  With 
the  exception  of  certain  obser\'ations  about  the  Policey  of  various 
states,  the  book  contains  little  that  can  be  used.  Again  a  pseudony- 
mous "C.  B.  von  L."  published  (1739)  Ohnverfdngliche  Vorschidge 
zu  Einrichtung  guter  Policey.  It  is  not  a  system,  and  contains  much 
that  is  chimerical  and  not  pertinent  to  the  science.  Lucas  Friedrich 
I.,angemack  published  Abbildung  einer  voUkommenen  Policey,  Berlin, 
1747.  In  this  brief  work  the  fundamental  principles  are  very  well 
and  philosophically  presented,  but  on  the  whole  it  is  not  specific 

>  The  pot  is  scandalized  at  the  color  of  the  kettle. 

'  Again  "eine  unbeschreibliche  Menge,"  which  is  a  trifle  strong  for 
a  critical  treatise. 


JUbTI'S  "POLICEYWISSENSCHAFT"  439 

enough  for  a  system.  The  Mecklenburg  Hojrath  Velter  published 
several  monographs  on  Policey:  e.  g.,  Unvorgreiflicften  Gedanken 
von  Einrichtung  und  Verbesserung  der  Policey,  1736;  more  impor- 
tant was  UnUrricht  von  der  zur  Stoats  und  Regierungswissensdtajt 
gehdrenden  Policey,  1753.  The  author  flatters  himself,  in  the  pro- 
spectus of  the  latter  book,  that  he  is  the  first  to  treat  this  science 
systematically,  but  no  one  with  an  orderly  mind  will  admit  this. 
The  book  is  not  only  confused,  but  leaves  out  much  that  should  be 
included,  and  has  much  affectation  of  wisdom  from  the  ancients, 
while  betraying  defective  judgment. 

The  English  and  French  have  produced  nothing  better.  De  la 
Marc's  Traits  de  Police  contains  certain  excellent  and  useful  things, 
but  has  no  well-grounded  and  connected  system. 

It  has  been  said  that  Zink's  book  is  more  available  as  a  text, 
because  it  describes  the  police  systems  of  other  lands,  and  applies 
the  general  principles  of  Policey  to  this  or  that  particular  state.  On 
the  contrary,  this  ought  not  to  be  expected  of  such  a  textbook.  We 
should  rather  require  of  a  textbook  on  the  oconomischen  Wissen- 
schaften  only  the  general  principles,  without  this  or  that  concrete 
application. 

"In  this  book  I  have  followed  my  usual  rule  of  not  citing  other 
authors.  A  dogmatic  writer'  must  present  the  subject  conclusively, 
and  if  he  does  this  he  does  not  need  the  authority  of  earlier  writers. 
Such  citations  smack  of  pedantry,  unless  they  contain  historical 
facts,  or  unless  some  special  circumstances  call  for  them."' 

Passing  to  the  body  of  the  book,  our  task  is  to  abstract  the 
more  general  conceptions,  within  which  the  technology  had 
its  setting,  from  the  applications,  which  of  course  make  up  the 
bulk  of  the  contents.  The  material  so  abstracted  is  cumulative 
evidence  for  our  interpretation  of  cameralism.  Reducing 
Justi's  propositions  to  the  most  compact  form,  we  have  the 
following  general  outline: 

'  Probably  "didactic"  would  be  nearer  to  Justi's  thought  than  the 
word  thus  literally  rendered. 

'  These  observations  by  Justi  tell  their  own  story  about  the  state 
of  the  social  sciences  at  his  time,  and  comment  would  be  superfluous. 


440  THE  CAMERALISTS 

{i.  The  name  Policey  comes  from  the  Greek  word  rilKu,  a  dty, 
and  should  mean  the  good  ordering  of  dties  and  of  their  dvic  insti- 
tutions. 

|§2,  3.  Two  uses  of  the  term  Policey  are  common  today:  first, 
and  most  generally,  "All  measures  in  the  internal  affairs  of  the 
country  through  which  the  general  means  [Vermdgen]  of  the  state 
may  be  more  permanently  founded  and  increased,  the  energies 
[KrSfU]  of  the  state  better  used,  and  in  general  the  happiness  of  the 
community  [gemeints  Wesen]  promoted.  In  this  sense  we  must 
indude  in  Policey  die  Commercienwissenschaften,  die  Stadt-  und 
LanddcoHomie,  das  Forstwesen,  and  similar  subjects,  in  so  far  as  the 
government  extends  its  care  over  them  for  the  purpose  of  securing 
general  correlation  of  the  welfare  of  the  state.  Some  are  accustomed 
to  call  this  die  tvirthschafUiche  Policey-Wissenschaft.  This  name 
is  a  matter  of  indifference  so  long  as  it  is  not  supposed  to  designate 
a  particular  sdence. 

J3.  In  the  narrower  sense  we  understand  by  Policey  everything 
which  is  requisite  for  the  good  ordering  of  dvic  life,  and  espedally 
the  maintenance  of  good  disdpline  and  order  [Zucht  und  Ordnung] 
among  the  subjects,  and  promotion  of  all  measures  for  the  comfort 
of  life  and  the  growth  of  the  sustaining  system  [Nahrungsstand]. 
We  shall  treat  here  the  general  prindples  and  rules  of  Policey  accord- 
ing to  the  comprehensive  idea.  In  the  spedal  elaboration  we  shall 
not  stop  to  consider  those  things  which  are  the  subject-matter  of 
other  economic  sdences,  and  meanwhile  we  shall  discuss  chiefly 
the  objects  of  Policey  in  the  narrower  sense.' 

I  The  difficulty  which  we  find  in  getting  a  distinct  conception  of 
Justi's  meaning  is  due  to  the  fact  that  his  own  ideas  were  not  clear.  His 
classifications  have  largely  been  abandoned,  even  by  bureaucratic  theo- 
rists. The  change  begins  to  be  visible  with  Rau,  Lehrbuch  der  politischen 
Oekonomie,  1826,  etc.  In  England  and  America  the  distribution  of 
activities,  and  consequently  the  theory  of  them,  left  no  place  for  Policey 
in  Justi's  sense. 

The  editor  of  the  third  edition  adds  as  his  own  definition  of  "  Policey," 
the  following  (p.  26):  "The  science  of  governing  the  various  occupations 
[Gewerbe]  according  to  the  purpose  of  the  state."  Of  coxirse  "  Smithism  " 
was  fundamentally  a  protest  against  the  thing  itself,  but  the  thing  itself 
was  the  very  genius  of  the  cameralistic  state.    There  consequently  had 


JUSTI'S  "POLICEYWISSENSCHAFT"  44 1 

§4.  The  purpose  and  consequently  the  essence  of  all  republics 
rests  upon  promotion  of  the  common  happiness.  The  general 
"means"  of  each  republic  is  the  resource  which  it  must  use  for  pro- 
moting its  happiness.  Hence  the  general  "means"  must  be  assured, 
increased,  and  reasonably  used,  i.  e.,  applied  for  the  promotion  of 
the  common  happiness.  This  is  the  content  [Inbegriff]  of  all  the 
economic  and  cameral  sciences.  The  maintenance  and  increase 
of  the  general  "means"  in  relations  with  other  free  states  is  the 
affair  of  Staatskunst.  Policeywissenschaft,  on  the  other  hand,  has 
for  its  object  the  maintenance  and  increase  of  the  same  general 
"means"  of  the  state  in  connection  with  its  inner  institutions,  while 
cameral  and  finance  science  has  for  its  task  to  raise  from  the  general 
"means"  of  the  state,  by  a  reasonable  use  of  the  same,  the  special, 
or  "readiest  means,"  and  to  put  into  the  hands  of  Staatskunst  and 
Pdicey  the  means  of  accomplishing  their  purposes. 

§5.  The  purpose  of  Policey  is  therefore  to  preserve  and  increase 
the  general  "means"  of  the  state;  and  since  these  "means"  include 
not  merely  the  goods,  but  also  the  talents  and  skill  of  all  persons 
belonging  to  the  republic,  the  Policey  must  have  constant  care  to 
have  in  mind  the  general  interdependence  of  all  these  different 
sorts  of  goods,  and  to  make  each  of  them  contribute  to  the  common 
happiness. 

§7.  Policeywissenschaft  consists  accordingly  in  understanding 
how,  under  existing  circumstances  of  the  community,  wise  measures 
may  be  taken  to  maintain  and  increase  the  general  "means"  of  the 
state  in  its  internal  relations  [Verfassung],  and  to  make  the  same, 

to  be  a  technology  of  it.  The  editor  continues:  "The  occupations  are 
agricultural  pursuits,  aitisanship,  trade,  and  personal  services.  The 
first  part  of  Policey  accordingly  treats  of  the  responsibilities  of  the  ruler 

with  respect  to  rural  employments The  second  part  of  Policey 

is  urban,  i.  e.,  the  Policey  of  the  handicrafts  and  trade,  as  the  two  occupa- 
tions peculiar  to  towns In  the  third  part  I  reckon,  for  example, 

medical  practice,  the  ecclesiastical  and  educational  system,  etc.  The 
fourth  part,  or  at  all  events  the  appendix,  should  treat  of  those  abandoned 
or  unfortunate  persons  who  will  not  pursue  any  of  the  occupations  men- 
tioned, and  hence  will  or  must  live  upon  the  diligence  of  other  people; 
L  e.,  beggars,  almshouses,  houses  of  correction,  and  workhouses. 


442  THE  CAMERALISTS 

both  in  its  correlation  and  in  its  parts,  more  efficient  and  useful  for 
promotion  of  the  common  happiness  [gemrinschafUiche  Gliickselig- 
keii\.  More  briefly,  Poeiceywissenschaft  consists  in  the  theorems 
for  presening  and  increasing  the  general  "means"  of  the  atate,  and 
for  so  using  them  that  they  will  better  promote  the  common  happiness. 

§8.  The  general  principle  of  Policeyv/issenschaft  is  accordingly: 
The  internal  instiiutiofis  of  the  community  mtist  be  so  arranged  that 
thereby  the  general  "means"  of  the  state  wiU  he  preserved  and  increased 
and  the  comment  happiness  constantly  promoted.^ 

§§9-16.  Hence  follow  three  fundamental  rules,  viz.: 

1.  Before  all  things  the  lands  of  the  republic  must  be  cultivated 
and  improved.' 

The  development  of  the  territories  may  take  plar^  in  two  ways: 
(a)  through  external  cultivation;  (b)  through  increase  of  the  popula- 
tion, which  may  be  called  the  internal  culture  of  the  lands.  The 
second  sort  of  culture  must  be  of  three  chief  kinds:  (i)  Through 
attraction  of  foreigners  as  settlers;  (2)  through  means  which  promote 
increase  of  the  native  inhabitants;  (3)  through  prevention  of  sickness 
and  premature  death. 

2.  Increase  of  the  products  of  the  country  and  the  prosperity  of 
the  sustaining  system  [Nahrungsstand]  must  be  promoted  in  every 
possible  way. 

3.  Care  must  be  given  to  securing  among  the  subjects  such  capaci- 
ties and  qualities,  and  such  discipline  and  order,  as  are  demanded  by 
the  ultimate  purpose,  viz.,  the  common  happiness. 

Book  I  is  devoted  to  the  subject  of  "the  external  cultiva- 
tion of  the  land,"  i.  e.,  to  all  measures  conducive  to  (i)  removal 
of  impediments  to  occupation  of  the  soil;  (2)  utilization  of 
the  material  advantages  of  the  land  in  all  its  parts;  (3)  pro- 
viding the  citizens  with  means  of  obtaining  shelter  and  support. 
Chap,  i  treats  of  the  improvement  of  the  soil  for  the  abode  and 

«  Vide  below,  p.  450  ei  passim. 

*  Vide  Grund/este,  I,  31.  I  cannot  decide  what  difference  in  meaning, 
if  any,  Justi  associated  with  the  two  words  CuUur  and  Anbau  which  he 
sometimes  seems  to  use  merely  as  synonyms  in  orotic  variola  and  some- 
times as  cumulative  expressions. 


JUSTI'S  "POLICEYWISSENSCHAFT"  443 

support  of  the  inhabitants.  Under  these  heads,  means  dis- 
cussed are,  in  general:  clearing  superfluous  forests,  draining 
ponds  and  swamps,  protecting  against  flooding  from  seas  or 
rivers,  bringing  barren  land  under  cultivation,  construction 
of  harbors,  making  streams  navigable  and  digging  canals, 
exploiting  mineral  and  rock  deposits,  utilization  of  land  formed 
by  recent  action  of  the  sea,  or  of  islands,  distribution  of  land, 
provision  for  both  large  and  small  estates,  establishment  of 
villages  and  attached  arable  areas  [Fluhre],  etc. 

Chap,  ii  deals  with  the  improvement  [i4n6a«]  and  growth 
of  cities,  and  does  not  vary  in  substance  from  the  corresponding 
passage  in  Staatswirthschaft.  The  purpose  of  cities  is  said 
to  be  to  work  up  raw  material  and  to  carry  on  foreign  com- 
merce. All  other  institutions  of  cities  must  end  in  these  two 
purposes.  Sites  should  be  chosen  which  are  favorable,  the 
general  plans  should  conform  to  the  needs,  the  dwellings  should 
not  be  left  entirely  to  the  caprice  of  the  citizens,  protection  in 
the  shape  of  walls,  gates,  harbors,  canals,  water  supply,  and 
drainage  must  be  furnished,  decisions  must  be  reached  about 
extensions  of  the  city,  those  who  furnish  material  and  labor 
must  be  looked  after,  means  must  be  taken  to  secure  circulation 
of  sufficient  money,  wealthy  and  talented  foreigners  and  arti- 
sans must  be  attracted,  the  immediately  neighboring  land  must 
be  made  productive,  diligence  must  be  stimulated,  means  of 
stimulating  foreign  trade  must  be  devised,  laws  and  statutes 
must  be  passed,  in  accordance  with  the  primary  and  secondary 
purposes  of  the  towns,  and  with  the  other  characteristics  of 
the  locality,  city  councils  must  be  so  organized  that  proper 
correlation  of  all  police  activities  will  be  promoted,  there  must 
be  special  courts  for  manufactures  and  for  trade,  Ziinfie  and 
Innungen  must  be  discouraged  in  new  factories  so  far  as  pos- 
sible, and  in  old  hand-trades  kept  in  close  bounds. 

Chap,  iii  deals  with  the  convenience  and  ornamentation 
of  country  and  city,  and  discusses  such  subjects  as  roads, 


444  THE  CAMERALISTS 

streets,  postal  systems,  bridges,  fountains,  reservoirs,  water- 
mains,  paving  and  cleaning  and  lighting  of  streets  and  alleys, 
marking  of  time  by  bells,  and  by  night  watchmen,  inns  and 
other  places  of  refreshment,  market-places,  public  conveyances, 
aesthetic  regulations,  parks  and  pleasure  gardens,  amusements, 
etc. 

Chap,  iv  begins  the  subject  of  "inner  cultivation  of  the 
land,  or  the  increase  of  population."  At  the  beginning  of  this 
chapter  another  of  the  passages  occurs  to  which  von  Mohl 
referred.*    It  is  as  follows: 

AU  external  improvement  of  a  land  would  be  of  little  avail,  if 
the  same  were  not  satisfactorily  settled  and  populated.  This  popu- 
lating is  the  internal  culdvation  which  must  give  to  external  culti- 
vation its  soul  and  life.  Hence  increase  of  population  is  the  second 
main  aim  in  the  cultivation  of  coxmtries,  and  just  as  the  sustaining 
system  will  always  be  more  flourishing,  the  more  people  there  are 
in  the  country,  so  we  must  regard  it  as  a  fundamental  theorem  in 
this  division  of  the  subject  that  a  land  can  never  have  too  many 
inhabitants.    It  is  easy  to  protect  this  theorem  against  all  objections. 

However  we  may  disagree  with  Justi's  presuppositions  and 
with  subsequent  conclusions,  we  do  not  do  him  justice  if  we 
charge  him,  as  von  Mohl  and  many  others  have  done,  with 
teaching  the  opposite  of  Malthusian  conclusions.  The  fact 
is  that  he  never  considered  the  Malthusian  problem  at  all. 
He  confronted  a  condition  of  under-population.  The  states 
for  which  he  spoke  needed  more  population  for  their  purposes, 
and  it  was  those  purposes  for  which  Justi  was  the  spokesman. 
He  would  have  put  the  case  precisely  as  he  meant  it  if  he  had 
said: 

For  the  purposes  of  a  practical  cameralist  today,  the  probability 
of  over-pop\ilation  may  be  canceled  from  the  reckoning. 

Although  it  had  never  occurred  to  him  to  pry  far  into  the 
relations  that  determined  the  limits  of  population,  there  is 

, «  Vid4  below,  p.  477. 


JUSTI'S  "POLICEYWISSENSCHAFT"  445 

nothing  in  his  books  to  show  that  he  supposed  population  could 
be  increased  indefinitely. 

§§86-96  develop  devices  for  attracting  immigrants.'  §§97-108 
develop  a  programme,  first,  for  increasing  population,  second,  for 
checking  emigradon.*    §§109-21  are  on  public  hygiene. 

Chap.  \u,  Von  der  Landwirthschaft,  approaches  the  subject 
rather  from  the  approximate  standpoint  of  the  agronomist, 
than  of  the  economist.    It  begins  (p.  109): 

The  promotion  of  the  sustaining  system  in  the  country  demands 
in  the  first  place  that  a  suffident  number  of  rural  products  shall  be 
gained.  To  that  end  the  rural  Policey  must  constantly  pay  great 
attention  to  those  sources  through  which  rural  products  are  derived. 
Here  then  the  rural  Orconomica  come  first  to  attention,  as  the  chief 
means  through  which  the  raw  materials  for  the  products  of  the 
country  are  brought  into  existence.  These^  are:  agriculture,  the 
exploiting  of  natural  and  cultivated  forests,  the  mines,  and  the 
thereto  appertaining  smelting  and  refining  works.  In  this  sub- 
division we  deal  first  with  agriculture. 

Perhaps  no  part  of  Justi's  cameralism  exhibits  better  than 
this  division  the  contrast  between  the  regime  which  he  repre- 
sented and  the  other  extreme  illustrated  by  American  policy. 
We  must  again  call  attention  to  the  main  question,  viz.,  What 
should  government  do  about  these  matters?  The  American 
answer  from  the  beginning  has  been,  "Nothing!  Every  man 
knows  best  what  he  wants,  and  government  has  no  right  to 
interfere,  so  long  as  each  lets  his  neighbors  alone."  We  have 
therefore  taken  absolute  individualism  as  our  presupposition, 
and  have  tried  in  every  way  to  cover  with  soothing  phrases  and 
fictions  each  departure  from  actual  individualism  which  chan- 
ging conditions  have  required.  The  most  important  factor 
in  bringing  about  in  reality,  through  our  voluntaristic  system, 

X  Vide  corresponding  passages  in  Staatsvnrthschqft. 
*  Also  parallel  with  same  topics  in  Staatswirthschaft. 
3  The  reference  goes  back  to  Oeconomica. 


446  THE  CAMERALISTS 

some  approach  to  scientific  use  of  our  agricultural  resources, 
has  been  our  legislation  establishing  agricultural  experiment 
stations,  and  systematic  instruction  in  rural  economy.  The 
thing  that  we  have  thus  tardily  and  cautiously  attempted  on 
the  ostensible  theory  that  it  is  primarily  the  affair  of  the  indi- 
vidual, has  from  time  immemorial  been  frankly  regarded 
in  the  German  lands  as  primarily  the  affair  of  govemmjent. 
It  is  no  part  of  the  present  study  to  inquire  about  the  relative 
efficiency  of  the  two  policies.  Two  general  remarks  only  are 
in  point:  first,  Englishmen  and  Americans  would  have  treated 
German  social  science  in  the  nineteenth  century  more  intelli- 
gently and  would  have  gained  more  from  it,  if  they  had  been 
more  willing  to  judge  it  on  its  own  grounds,  and  had  been 
less  prone  to  damn  "paternalism"  and  all  its  works;  second, 
whether  on  a  paternalistic  or  an  individualistic  theory,  much 
that  cameralistic  administration  worked  out,  especially  in  its 
latest  forms  in  modem  Germany,  is  evidently  enlightened 
wisdom  for  a  commonwealth.  Bureaucracy,  or  no  bureaucracy, 
the  things  themselves  need  to  be  done,  or  at  least  a  construct- 
ive and  coherent  policy  with  reference  to  them  needs  to  be 
adopted.  Study  of  the  bureaucratic  way  of  doing  them  may 
tend  to  confirm  most  Americans  in  dislike  of  that  way,  but  it 
ought  at  least  to  make  them  more  able  to  perceive  that  in  point 
of  results  we  are  at  a  disadvantage,  and  that  our  system  is  not 
vindicated  until  its  technical  results  compare  more  favorably 
with  those  of  the  more  paternalistic  German  system. 

We  have  then  in  cameralism  a  body  of  officials  presiding 
over  agricultural  programmes  just  as  a  general  staff  conducts 
the  administration  of  a  modem  army.  The  Landes-Policey 
deals  with  such  subjects  as  the  organization  of  larger  and 
smaller  rural  estates  (§124),  the  regulation  of  acreage  devoted 
to  different  crops  on  these  estates  (§125),  the  adjustment  of 
taxation  so  as  best  to  stimulate  agriculture  (§126),  the  protec- 
tion of  cultivators  against  the  interests  of  hunting  or  forestry 


JUSTI'S  "POLICEYWISSENSCHAFT"  447 

(§127),  regulation  of  other  occupations  which  might  draw  the 
peasants  from  cultivation  of  the  soil  (§128),  stimulation  of  agri- 
cultural talent  in  the  peasants  (§129),  inducing  production  of 
raw  materials  which  would  not  be  raised  without  special 
stimulus  (§130),  improvement  of  the  quality  of  products  (§131), 
employment  of  "economic  inspectors"  to  supervise  all  these 
things  (§132),  adoption  of  uniform  systems  of  measuring  land 
(§133),  adoption  of  rules  of  rotation  of  crops  and  other  regula- 
tions, like  the  wages  of  laborers,  etc.  (§134),  adoption  of  special 
standards  for  particular  products,  kinds  of  seed  to  be  used, 
etc.  (§135),  enactment  of  ordinances  to  protect  growing  crops 
from  thieves,  etc.  (§136),  particular  attention  to  cattle-raising 
(137),  also  to  vineyards  (§138),  and  to  horticulture  (§139). 

In  chap,  viii  cameralistic  duties  regarding  forestry,  mining, 
and  minor  industries  are  analyzed  (§§140-49).  "Manufac- 
turing and  factories"  are  treated  in  the  same  relation  in  chap. 
ix  (§§150-80),  and  on  these  two  presumptions  (§152): 

A  wise  government  must  consequently  have  two  theorems  con- 
stantly before  its  eyes,  viz.:  (i)  Everything  required  hy  the  need  and 
comfort  0}  the  inhabitants  of  the  country  is  to  be  produced  as  far  as 
possible  within  the  country  itself;  (2)  the  government  shall  see  that, 
in  the  interest  of  the  sustaining  system,  and  of  foreign  commerce, 
everything  that  the  land  produces  shall,  so  far  as  possible,  be  worked 
over  to  its  complete  form,  and  shall  not  be  allowed  to  leave  the  country 
in  a  raw  and  unfinished  stale.  To  this  end  the  government  must 
have  precise  extracts  from  the  tariff,  excise,  and  license  sheets,  on 
such  points  as  (a)  all  imported  goods,  in  order  to  judge  which  of 
(hem  might  be  produced  within  the  country;  (h)  all  exjiorted  goods, 
in  order  to  discover  whether  domestic  products  in  the  form  of  raw 
materials,  or  partially  manufactured,  are  exported. 

Thereupon  the  technique  of  keeping  check  upon  raw. 
material  produced  or  producible  in  the  country,  of  materials 
which  must  be  supplied  by  other  countries,  and  of  tools, 
etc.,  needed  for  working  up  the  materials  is  discussed  (§§153- 


448  THE  CAMERALISTS 

55),  and  then  the  programme  for  developing  manufactures 
(§§156-80).  The  whole  is  merely  a  somewhat  expanded 
reproduction  of  the  corresponding  part  of  Staatswirthschaft. 

Chap.  X  treats  very  briefly  the  hand  industries  (§§181-90), 
and  chap,  xi  claims  to  offer  only  fundamental  principles  of 
commercial  administration,  with  the  intention  of  devoting 
a  separate  volume  to  the  subject.  Justi  divides  commerce 
[Commercien]  into  domestic  and  foreign,  applying  to  the  former 
the  name  trades  [Gewerben],  and  repeating  that  a  land  might 
conceivably  be  happy  if  the  trades  flourished,  even  if  there 
were  no  commerce.  Then  the  fundamental  condition  of  a 
favorable  balance  is  mobilized  as  the  basic  principle  of  com- 
mercial administration.  The  details  are  not  greatly  in  excess 
of  those  indicated  in  Staatswirthschaft. 

Chap,  xii,  on  the  circulation  of  money,  contains  little,  for 
our  purposes,  which  does  not  occur  elsewhere  in  Justi's  books. 
The  fundamentally  correct  conception  of  gold  and  silver  money 
as  a  "ware,"  the  weight  and  fineness  of  which  are  accurately 
given,  b  repeated  (§321-23).  The  last  of  these  paragraphs 
is  worth  quoting  as  cumulative  evidence: 

If  money  and  goods  are  to  retain  a  constant  ratio  to  each  other, 
no  change  should  occur  in  either;  and  if  such  change  could  be  totally 
avoided,  it  would  be  a  matter  of  entire  indifference  whether  there 
were  much  or  little  money  in  a  country.  A  state  which  had  no  rela- 
tions whatever  with  other  peoples,  and  whose  inhabitants  consiuned 
all  that  they  produced,  would  have  a  constantly  imbroken  circulation 
of  money.  It  would  have  all  the  power  and  strength  of  which  it 
was  capable,  and  it  would  be  as  fortunate  as  another  state  of  like 
population  with  ten  times  as  much  gold  and  silver.  But  since  no 
state  in  our  part  of  the  world  is  in  such  circumstances,  changes  in 
the  value  of  money  and  of  goods  with  respect  to  each  other  often 
occur.    We  must  explain  the  effect  of  these  changes  upon  circulation. 

In  general  Justi  continues  (§§324  ff.): 

If  the  amount  of  money  in  circulation  diminishes,  the  price  of 
wares  will  increase,  beginning  with  the  most  needless,  the  influence 


JUSTI'S  "POLICEYWISSENSCHAFT"  449 

extending  gradually  to  all.  If  the  quantity  of  money  in  circulation 
increases,  the  most  necessary  wares  will  grow  dearer.  This  stimulates 
the  activity  of  laborers  and  has  its  influence  upon  all  wares.  Money 
becomes  less  desirable,  interest  falls,  more  wares  are  produced. 
Gradually  wares  will  again  become  cheaper,  and  thereby  exporta- 
tion is  promoted,  whereby  the  quantity  of  money  in  circulation  is 
more  and  more  increased  and  the  diligence  of  laborers  more  stimu- 
lated. Accordingly  it  must  be  a  first  care  of  the  government  to  pre- 
vent diminution  of  the  amount  of  money  in  circulation  (§226). 
Lack  of  confidence  and  external  dangers  are  prime  causes  of  dimin- 
ished circulation  ($228).  Unfavorable  trade  balance  is  the  most 
effective  cause  (§230). 

Chap,  xiii,  on  credit,  is  interesting  for  the  historian  of  eco- 
nomics proper,  but  is  not  immediately  significant  for  our 
purpose.  The  same  is  true  of  chaps,  xiv  and  xv  on  means  of 
encouraging  the  laboring  classes. 

Book  III,  on  the  moral  condition  of  the  subjects,  and 
maintenance  of  good  discipline  and  order,  has  value  for  our 
present  inquiry  simply  as  cumulative  evidence  that  the  prob- 
lem which  Justi  formulated  was  essentially  patriarchal.  The 
point  of  attachment  between  this  division  of  labor  and  the 
whole  purpose  of  the  cameralistic  state,  appears  at  the  outset, 
as  follows  (§270): 

If  the  means  of  the  state  in  its  internal  constitution  are  to  be  used 
for  the  promotion  of  the  common  happiness,  the  subjects,  apart  from 
the  cultivation  of  the  land  and  the  promotion  of  the  sustaining  sys- 
tem, must  also  themselves  possess  such  qualities,  capacities,  and 
talents  that  "they  can  contribute  their  part  to  the  realization  of  the 
common  welfare.  In  this  view  religion  deserves  first  to  be  consid- 
ered. The  members  of  a  community  are  made  by  religion  incom- 
parably more  capable  of  fulfilling  their  duties  as  citizens;  and  a 
state  can  hardly  attain  all  the  happiness  of  which  it  is  capable  if 
public  institutions  of  religion  [Uusserlicher  Gottesdienst]  are  not 
introduced.  The  more  this  cultus  harmonizes  with  the  nature  and 
essence  of  men,  and  with  the  paramount  purpose  of  republics,  the 


45°  THE  CAMERALISTS 

more  excellent  will  it  be,  and  the  more  capable  will  it  make  the 
citizens  of  the  state  to  work  for  the  conmion  welfare. 

The  same  point  of  view  is  adopted  in  considering  the  morals 
of  the  people  (§§285  ff.)>  ^^'^  ^-Iso  in  treating  science  and 
education  (§§295  ff.). 

Whether  religion,  morals,  and  education  are  to  be  regarded 
as  primarily  afiFairs  of  the  individual,  and  thus  not  to  be  inter- 
fered with  by  government,  is  a  question  to  which  Germany 
has  always  assumed  one  answer,  while  the  United  States  has 
tried  to  apply  the  opposite  answer.  Our  business  in  the 
present  connection  is  not  to  open  the  question  of  principle,  but 
merely  to  show  the  attitude  of  cameralism  toward  the  question. 
The  state  and  its  power  to  maintain  itself  against  all  assault 
from  within  or  without  being  the  central  aim,  of  course  it  was 
a  strictly  logical  inference  that  everything  which  could  have 
an  effect  on  the  strength  of  the  state  was  properly  within  the 
sphere  of  state  supervision. 

It  is  beginning  to  be  possible  for  a  few  people  to  discern 
that  the  old  dilemma  between  the  individual  and  the  state 
was  purely  fictitious  in  the  abstract,  and  that  neither  horn  of 
the  dilemma  could  be  taken  as  the  symbol  of  a  concrete  pro- 
gramme without  surprising  results.  Religion,  morals,  science, 
and  education  have  both  individual  and  social  relations,  if 
we  choose  to  retain  that  distinction.  We  are  at  once  in  the 
region  of  absurdity  if  we  attempt  to  run  a  legal  boundary  line 
between  their  individual  and  their  social  phases.  The  real 
question  for  governmental  theory  is  not  whether  they  are  the 
one  or  the  other,  but  to  what  extent  and  in  what  ways  either 
phase  must  be  taken  account  of  by  the  law.  The  arbitrary 
character  of  the  traditional  criterion  might  be  inferred  from 
the  historical  contrasts  between  theory  and  practice.  The 
German  presumption  at  once  runs  counter  to  individual  aspects 
of  each,  which  dictate  a  thus-far-and-no-farther  to  government, 
while  the  American  presumption  not  only  gives  itself  curious 


JUSTI'S  "POLICEYWISSENSCHAFT"  45 1 

things  to  account  for  in  our  actual  practice  toward  religious 
institutions,  moral  conditions,  and  scientific  needs,  but  it  almost 
wholly  disappears  in  our  systems  of  state  education. 

The  chapters  on  administration  of  justice  (§§339-59), 
and  preserving  the  peace  and  checking  the  lesser  nuisances  and 
crimes  (§§360-80),  are  notable  only  as  indexes  of  the  place 
which  cameralism  assigned  to  these  subjects  in  the  civic  struc- 
ture. 

The  last  book  is  a  brief  discussion  of  the  technique  to  be 
operated  by  the  branches  of  government  concerned  with  apply- 
ing the  foregoing  principles  of  police  science.  Justi  says  that 
in  a  certain  sense  the  subject-matter  of  this  book  forms  the 
practical  part  of  police  science  (p.  327).  The  following  para- 
graph confirms  our  account  of  the  cameralistic  state  (§382) : 

The  law-giving  power  in  police  affairs,  since  the  internal  arrange- 
ment of  the  state  chiefly  rests  upon  it,  can  unquestionably  be  exer- 
cised by  no  one  but  the  sovereign  power,  the  destiny  of  which  is  to 
administer  the  affairs  of  the  state  for  promotion  of  the  common 
happiness.  In  whosesoever  hands  the  sovereign  power  is  lodged, 
he  has  also  to  enact  the  police  laws  which  are  to  bind  the  state  as  a 
whole.  If  now  the  sovereign  power  rests  not  alone  in  the  hands 
of  the  ruler,  but  at  the  same  time  also  with  the  estates  of  the  realm, 
or  with  representatives  of  the  people,  obligatory  police  laws  must 
be  agreed  up>on  and  promulgated  by  these  conjointly.  On  the  same 
principle,  the  police  laws  which  should  affect  the  whole  German 
Empire  should  be  enacted  by  the  Kaiser  and  the  estates  assembed 
in  the  Reichstag. 

Again,    §384: 

Since  the  territorial  sovereignty  which  the  estates  of  the  German 
Empire  possess  is  nothing  else  than  the  sovereign  power  in  each 
particular  state,  which  finds  its  limitations  merely  in  the  proviso 
that  its  exercise  shall  not  extend  so  far  as  to  prejudice  the  general 
coherence  and  common  welfare  of  the  Empire;  the  estates  of  the 
German  Empire  accordingly  possess  the  law-giving  power  in  Policey 
affairs;  and  the  above  limitation  does  noc  prevent  them  from  adopt 


452  THE  CAMERALISTS 

ing  such  Policey  institutions  and  ordinances  as  will  senc  the  advan- 
tage and  prosperity  of  their  respective  lands;  even  if  this  advantage 
and  prosperity  might  not  harmonize  with  the  interest  of  other 
German  states.  Thus  they  could  ordain  that  no  wares  should  be 
imported  from  neighboring  German  states  for  consumption  within 
their  own  territories.  On  the  other  hand,  they  could  not  forbid 
the  mere  transportation  of  the  wares  of  their  neighbors;  because 
thereby  the  total  coherence  of  the  German  states  united  in  a  common 
civic  body  would  be  utterly  destroyed. 

The  following  sections  (§§385  f!.)  explain  how  this  power 
is  actually  exercised  in  the  name  of  the  sovereign. 

To  complete  our  account  of  Justi's  Policeywissenschaft  we 
turn  to  the  work  in  which  the  author  has  expanded  the  out- 
line just  reviewed.  With  the  possible  exception  of  the  Finanz- 
wissenschaft,  the  Grundfeste^  is  the  most  elaborately  wrought- 
out  of  Justi's  works.  We  must  nevertheless  allow  our  r^sum^ 
of  the  Grundsatze  to  stand  as  the  best  index  which  our  space 
permits  of  the  general  contents  of  the  more  complete  treatise. 
The  system  of  control  outlined  in  the  Grundfeste  reflects  a 
regime  which  the  people  of  the  United  States  have  thus  far, 
by  almost  unanimous  consent,  refused  to  reflect  upon  judicially. 
They  have  dismissed  it  without  a  hearing,  as  "unamerican." 
Nevertheless,  it  is  safe  to  predict  that  the  time  will  come  when 
thoughtful  Americans  will  be  able  to  deliberate  about  the  system 
exhibited  in  an  immature  form  in  these  books,  to  weigh  the  pur- 
poses which  the  system  was  designed  to  serve,  and  to  conclude 
that  although  the  methods  of  control  which  the  purposes  pre- 
suppose are  impossible  in  America,  yet  the  purposes  themselves 
must  in  principle  be  organized  somehow  into  the  most  highly 
civilized  life. 

This  conclusion  must  be  allowed  to  rest  on  the  exhibit  thus 

I  It  is  a  fair  surmise  that  Justi  got  this  title  from  the  heading  of 
chap,  zxxiii,  in  Scbrdder's  FUrst.  Schati-  und  RerU-Cammer;  vide 
above,  p.  167. 


JUSTFS  "POLICEYWISSENSCHAFT"  453 

far  made  of  the  different  police  systems.     We  may  add  merely 
a  few  notes  from  the  Grundfeste. 

In  the  Preface  to  the  first  volume  Justi  says: 

I  have  often  noticed  that  there  are  very  few  people  who  have  a 
correct  idea  of  Policey.  That  which  in  the  narrowest  sense  is  called 
Policey,  namely  the  Policey  in  the  cities,  is  regarded  by  the  majority 
as  the  whole  scope  of  this  science.  If  this  very  limited  signification 
were  the  whole,  I  should  have  insufficient  ground  for  calling  the 
Policey  the  main  defense  of  states.  Both  the  Grundsdtze  and  the 
present  work  should  make  it  plain  that  the  scope  of  the  science  is 
much  wider. 

Justi  complains  that  most  writers  on  Policey  have  not 
sharply  separated  the  subject  from  Staatskunst.^ 

It  will  be  found  [he  says]  that  as  a  rule  those  who  have  treated 
St<iatskunst  have  at  the  same  time  discussed  Policey  with  Commer- 
cien-  und  Finanz-Wissenschaft.  This  is  the  case,  for  example,  with 
the  latest  writer  on  StcMtskunst.'  If  our  conception  of  Slaatskunst 
or  Politik  made  it  include  not  only  all  knowledge  necessary  for  the 
government  of  a  state,  but  also  all  the  details  of  institutions  neces- 
sary in  civic  society,  those  would  be  right  who  include  in  one  system 
of  Politik,  Policey,  the  Fittanz-Wissenschaften,  and  all  the  other 

«  Vide  above,  p.  328. 

»  "Baron  von  Bielfeld,  born  17 16,  Hamburg,  of  an  aristocratic 
merchant  family,  died  1770.  He  was  a  friend  of  Frederick  the  Great 
when  the  latter  was  crown  prince.  Was  for  a  while  guest  of  the  latter 
in  Rheinsberg,  and  immediately  upon  his  accession  entered  his  diplomatic 
service.  After"  1741  he  was  Legationsrath  in  the  foreign  department, 
later  second  Hofmeister  of  a  Prussian  prince;  after  1747  Oberaufseher 
of  the  Prussian  universities,  but  without  the  least  loss  of  the  king's  favor 
retired  presently  to  his  estates.  His  writings,  the  most  important  of 
which,  the  InstUulions  Politiques,  appeared  in  1760,  suggest  not  merely 
by  their  French  dress,  but  also  by  their  genial  cosmof>olitan  tone,  Fred- 
erick the  Great,  much  more  than  contemf>orary  academic  specialists. 
Schlozer  credits  him  with  the  immortal  honor  of  having  first  introduced 
learned  politics  at  courts  1"    (Roscher,  p.  426.) 


454  THE  CAMERALISTS 

economic  sciences.'  But,  in  that  case  Staatskunst  would  be  no 
sj>ecial  science  at  all.  It  would  be  nothing  but  a  general  name  for 
almost  all  other  sciences.  Die  Rechtsgelehrsamkeit,  die  Bergwerks- 
Wissenschajten,  die  Mathemctik,  die  Mechanik,  and  almost  all  other 
sciences  would  belong  to  Staatskunst.  For  all  these  furnish  knowl- 
edge which  is  applicable  in  the  government  of  a  state,  and  necessary 
for  the  institutions  and  practices  of  civic  society.  In  a  word,  they 
all  contain  knowledge  of  means  whereby  the  state  may  be  made 
powerful,  and  the  citizens  happy.  That  is  the  explanation  which 
Baron  von  Bielfeld  gives  of  Politik. 

Justi  declines  to  accept  this  description  of  Staatskunst. 
He  contends  that  it  has  been  at  all  times  not  a  general  name 
for  many  and  almost  all  sciences,  but  a  special  and  self- 
sufficient  science,  sharply  distinguished  from  Policey,  Finanz- 
und  Commercien-Wissenschaft.  Then  he  restates  his  definition 
of  Policey  thus: 

'7/  is  that  science  which  has  for  its  object  pertnanently  to  maintain 
the  welfare  of  the  separate  families  in  an  accurate  correspondence  and 
proportion  with  the  best  common  good.^^  This  definition  is  supported 
by  the  comment:  "The  best  common  good  {das  gemeinschaftliche 
Beste]  is  the  ultimate  aim  of  all  civic  institutions.  But,  we  can  ima- 
gine no  best  common  good  without  the  welfare  of  the  separate  faniilies. 
To  make  these  correspond  with  each  other  is  accordingly  in  fact  the 
main  defense  of  the  state,  out  of  which  its  power  and  happiness  must 
chiefly  arise."* 

Justi  elaborates  in  this  connection  his  theory  of  the  division 
of  labor  between  Staatskunst  and  the  other  "sciences."  We 
have  already  quoted  from  the  Staatswirthschaft  his  principal 
propositions  on  this  classification.-^ 

'  In  this  case  it  is  clear  that  the  phrase  "die  oconomischen  Wissen- 
schaflen,"  which  I  have  rendered  "economic  sciences,"  had  a  meaning 
for  Justi  which  would  be  more  exactly  represented  to  our  minds  by  the 
phrase  "social  technologies." 

»  This  definition  is  amplified  on  p.  4,  also  pp.  6-9. 

3  Vide  above,  p.  328  e/  passim. 


JUSTI'S  "POLICEYWISSENSCHAFT"  455 

A  curious  measure  of  Justi's  sense  of  proportion  may  be 
found  in  the  fact  that  he  occupies  five  out  of  the  fourteen  pages 
of  his  Preface  with  a  discussion  of  the  relative  merits  of  differ- 
ent printing  establishments.  His  laudation  of  the  publisher 
chosen  for  this  work,  after  relation  of  sad  experiences  with 
others,  one  of  them  named,  rouses  the  suspicion  that  a  motive 
less  disinterested  than  zeal  for  improvement  of  the  art  of  print- 
ing was  beneath  this  discourse.  Incidentally  he  betrays  a 
characteristic  trait  of  the  whole  Policey  regime,  as  well  as  of 
his  personal  theory,  in  this  suggestion: 

Perhaps  we  find  here  a  lack  in  our  Policey.  It  is  without  doubt 
the  duty  of  the  Policey  to  look  out  for  the  quality  of  wares  and  work, 
and  to  set  the  standard  below  which  work  shall  be  regarded  as  entirely 
unfit,  and  to  be  made  good  to  the  person  who  suffers  injury  from  it. 
I  doubt,  however,  if  there  is  a  country  in  which  a  standard  of  passable 
quality  in  printing  is  enforced.  The  more  our  publishing  system 
becomes  a  staple  ware  (sic)  the  more  will  such  laws  be  necessary.' 

Having  discussed  the  evils  of  putting  the  emphasis  in  the 
state  either  on  the  interests  of  the  government,  or  on  those  of 
the  separate  families,  to  the  prejudice  of  the  other,  Justi  offers 
the  following  "general  fundamental  principle"  of  Policey- 
wissenschaft,  viz.: 

In  all  the  affairs  of  tJie  country,  the  attempt  must  be  made  to  put  the 
•welfare  of  the  separate  families  in  the  most  accurate  combination  and 
interdependence  with  the  best  common  good,  or  the  happiness  of  the 
whole  state.* 

»  Justi's  most  explicit  attempt  to  explain  the  etymology  of  the  tenn 
Policey  occurs  on  p.  5,  Part  I.  He  quotes  from  Xenophon's  Athenian 
Republic  to  show  that  the  word  UoXlTela  meant  "not  only  the  internal 
institutions  of  a  state,  but  the  whole  governmental  system  of  a  community: 
and  even  what  we  now  express  by  the  word  republic." 

'  The  author  calls  attention  to  the  divergence  of  this  proposition 
in  form  from  that  in  Grundsatzen  der  Policeywissenschaft  EXnleitung, 
{8,  p.  7.  He  explains  that  the  two  formulas  do  not  essentially  differ. 
{Vide  above,  pp.  442.) 


456  THE  CAMERALISTS 

In  the  most  emphatic  terms  he  declares  that  this  is  the  single 
great  object  of  police  institutions,  and  that  all  the  major  and 
minor  rules  of  Policey  must  be  derived  from  this  central  purpose. 

Less  fundamental,  but  more  significant  for  the  matter  upon 
which  tradition  has  most  stupidly  misrepresented  the  cameral- 
isls  in  general,  is  the  main  theorem  which  the  first  part  of  the 
work  supports,  viz.:  'TAe  strength  and  the  permanent  happi- 
ness of  a  state  rest  principally  upon  the  goodness  of  the  climate 
and  soil  of  the  country."  Justi  is  not  among  the  writers  whose 
attention  is  given  chiefly  to  agricultural  technique.  He  evi- 
dently knew  comparatively  little  about  agriculture  proper.  Of 
the  extractive  industries,  mining  was  the  only  pursuit  about 
which  he  professed  to  write  as  an  expert.  Yet  the  place  which 
he  assigned  to  agriculture  in  his  theory  leaves  no  valid  excuse 
for  applying  to  him  the  label  "mercantilist,"  if  it  carries  the 
traditional  meaning  "believer  in  trade  as  the  sole  source  of 
wealth."  Instead  of  accepting  this  doctrine,  Justi  urges  (§27) 
that  "economic  trade,"  as  the  phrase  went,  that  is,  the  trade 
of  a  nation  of  middlemen,  like  Holland  in  the  seventeenth  and 
eighteenth  centuries,  is  a  precarious  source  of  national  pros- 
perity and  wealth.     He  says: 

Fconomic  trade  is  always  based  on  the  stupidity  and  laziness  of 
other  peoples.  So  soon  as  a  people  perceives  that  it  does  better  when 
it  gets  its  wares  from  the  first  hand,  it  is  all  over  with  this  economic 
trade.  Upon  quite  as  uncertain  ground  rest  the  manufactures  of 
such  a  country.  A  wise  and  industrious  people  will  always  seek  to 
manufacture  its  own  raw  materials.  Hence  this  source  of  riches 
rests  on  the  stupidity  and  laziness  of  other  peoples,  and  so  soon  as 
these  peoples  get  their  eyes  open,  they  will  no  longer  furnish  to 

the  trading  nation  a  source  of  riches A  nation  which,  by 

virtue  of  its  good  and  well-cultivated  soil,  exports  a  great  quantity 
of  domestic  products  is  also  in  a  situation,  according  to  the  nature 
and  course  of  commerce,  to  draw  to  itself  much  easier  and  to  retain 
even  the  economic  trade,  than  another  nation  which  has  few  domestic 
products. 


JUSTI'S  " POLICE YWISSENSCHAFT"  457 

From  all  this  it  is  clear  in  my  judgment,  that  the  success  and 
permanent  happiness  of  a  people  rest  in  a  very  important  degree 
upon  the  good  character  of  its  soil  and  climate,  and  that  a  people 
which  itself  produces  all  its  needs  (sic)  and  many  domestic  goods 
is  incomparably  more  powerful  and  happy  than  a  nation  which  must 
obtain  its  necessities  and  wares  for  consumption  from  other  peoples, 
and  thus  is  in  a  certain  sense  dependent  upon  them. 

These  considerations  lead  us  to  two  theorems  which  will  be  of 
great  importance  in  the  whole  treatment  of  Policey:  First,  a  prudent 
nation  must  always  take  care  to  put  itself  in  such  condition  that  it 
is  not  under  the  necessity  of  obtaining  its  most  important  wants  [Bediirf- 
nisse]  and  materials  from  other  peoples;  second,  a  nation  must  seek 
in  every  possible  way  to  cultivate  the  area  which  it  occupies  and  to 
improve  its  climate. 

This  proposition  is  not  only  repeated  in  slightly  varied  form 
in  the  following  paragraph,  but  the  body  of  the  book  expands 
it,  and  Justi's  whole  philosophy  presupposes  it. 

Along  with  this  fundamental  principle,  Justi  next  reiterates 
his  second  main  theorem  (§30),  viz.: 

Since  there  can  never  be  complete  cultivation  of  the  soil  without 
dense  population,  our  second  working  theorem  is,  that  a  state  must 
in  every  way  promote  population. 

These  theorems  are  insufficient  without  a  third,  viz.:  //  a  state 
has  only  inhabitants  devoted  to  cultivation  of  the  surface  of  the  earth, 

its  population  can  never  be  dense Consequently  we  have  the 

third  fundamental  principle:  that  government  must  constantly  pay 
the  strictest  attention  to  the  building  and  growth  of  cities  and  villages 

(§31). 

A  fourth  theorem  must  be  added,  viz. :  The  Policey  must  devote 
itself  to  works  and  institutions  for  the  comfort  of  the  inhabitants  and 
the  ornamentation  of  the  land  (§32). 

Each  of  the  four  books  of  the  first  part  of  the  Grundfeste 
develops  one  of  these  four  theorems. 

In  the  Preface  of  the  second  volume  Justi  professes  an  entire 
reversal  of  literary  policy.     He  says:    "The  attentive  reader 


458  THE  CAMERALISTS 

will  be  able  to  judge  how  great  pains  I  have  taken  to  seek 
out  the  most  excellent  thoughts  of  the  greatest  minds,  in  order 
thereby  to  strengthen  my  discussion."  The  fact  is  that  Justi 
was  from  the  start  the  most  expert  recoiner  of  other  people's 
thoughts  that  German  political  literature  up  to  his  time  had 
developed.  He  had  not  before  approached  so  near  to  a  con- 
fession that  he  was  more  a  codifier  than  a  first-hand  investi- 
gator. The  Preface  is  chiefly  devoted  to  a  defense  against  the 
criticism  of  Baron  von  Bielfeld  that  Justi  had  included  altogether 
too  much  in  Foliceywissenschaft.  The  passage  is  so  character- 
istic of  the  time  and  of  the  author  that  no  independent  student 
of  the  subject  should  neglect  to  read  it. 

Probably  there  is  no  more  accurate  and  detailed  contem- 
porary j)icture  of  the  policy  behind  Frederick  the  Great's 
tyf>e  of  benevolent  despotism,  at  least  no  jncture  of  the  policy 
as  it  was  idealized  in  the  minds  of  theorists,  than  the  views 
presented  in  these  two  volumes  of  the  Grund/este,  together  with 
the  later  work,  System  des  Staaiswesens  (i  766).  ks  the  evidence 
already  presented  is  more  than  sufficient  to  support  our  main 
contention,  we  must  pass  these  volumes  with  the  remark  that 
their  contents  are  cumulative  proof  of  the  correctness  of  the 
view  we  have  taken  of  cameralism  in  general. 


CHAPTER  XVII 
JUSTI'S  CAMERALISTIC  MISCELLANIES 

To  complete  the  exhibit  which  the  compass  of  this  book 
permits  us  to  make  of  Justi's  views,  we  must  draw  from  his 
collected  miscellanies.  Without  attempting  to  organize  these 
extracts  into  systematic  form,  we  shall  present  them  in  the 
accidental  order  in  which  they  occur  in  the  three  volumes.' 
This  chapter  is  therefore  in  efifect  an  appendix,  consisting 
principally  of  notes  which  serve  to  emphasize  certain  features 
already  referred  to  in  the  author's  theory. 

The  Preface  to  Vol.  I  of  this  collection  is  dated  Berlin, 
Sept.  3,  1760.  It  refers  to  "the  present  war"  (i.  e.,  the  Seven 
Years'  War,  1756-63)  as  hindering  the  correspondence  with 
Austrian  publishers,  who  wanted  to  get  out  a  new  edition  of 
some  of  these  papers  previously  published  in  Teutschen 
Memoires. 

The  Preface  to  Vol.  I  repeats  the  theme  of  cameralism 
in  this  form: 

Money  is  today  so  largely  the  ground  {sic)  of  all  the  activity 
of  the  state,  that  the  greatest  courage  and  the  greatest  bravery  of 
a  people  in  our  time  can  have  little  success  if  it  is  not  provided  with 
sufficient  money,  that  great  motive  spring  and  nervous  fluid  of  all 
undertakings  which  are  to  attain  fortunate  results.  We  must  go 
farther;  we  must  indeed  affirm  that  the  most  wholesome  and  excel- 
lent arrangements  and  institutions  of  a  state  will  have  little  success 
along  with  a  bad  condition  of  the  financial  system  of  the  state. 

Again,  in  the  same  preface  (the  pages  are  not  numbered) : 

I  believe  that  we  still  lack  a  species  of  history  which  would  be 

peculiarly  useful.    The  historical  books  of  all  peoples  are  concerned 

»  Johann  Heinrich  Gottlobs  von  Justi,  Gesammelte  Politische  und 
Finanzschriften  iiber  vnctUige  Gegenstdnde  der  Staatskunst,  der  Kriegs- 
wissenschaften  und  des  Cameral-  und  Finanzwesens 1761. 

459 


46o  THE  CAMERALISTS 

almost  entirely  with  extraordinary  and  unfortunate  occurrences 
with  wars  and  slaughters  which  peoples  have  waged  against  one 
another,  with  narration  of  extraordinary  rascalities  and  villanies, 
and  the  succession  of  rulers.  In  my  opinion  this  is  of  least  value 
and  least  instructive  in  history.  We  should  have  a  history  from  the 
earliest  times  in  which  the  chief  attention  would  be  given  to  the  origin 
of  realms  and  states,  to  the  efiForts  to  found  them  and  to  bring  them 
into  a  flourishing  condition,  to  the  principles  of  government  in 
political,  financial,  and  police  affairs,  to  the  attempts  to  cultivate 
and  people  the  lands,  to  the  causes  of  the  growth  and  decay  of  realms 
and  states,  and'  especially  to  the  governmental  mistakes  which  rulers 
and  ministers  have  committed.  On  the  other  hand,  the  wars  and 
other  matters  which  heretofore  have  filled  the  histories  should  be 
mentioned  only  in  passing,  in  so  far  as  they  have  had  a  greater  or 
less  influence  upon  the  welfare  or  decline  of  civic  societies.  If  a 
history  were  so  constructed,  we  could  say  that  history  is  a  mirror  of 
human  transactions.  As  histories  are  now  written  I  believe  they 
have  very  little  claim  to  such  a  tide.  I  have  made  up  my  mind  to 
write  such  a  history.  I  will  give  it  the  title:  The  History  of  Mankind 
as  Citizens  [Die  Geschichte  des  Menschen,  als  Burger].^  In  my 
opinion  such  a  history,  if  it  satisfied  its  purpose,  would  go  far  toward 
extending  a  knowledge  of  true  governmental  and  financial  principles 
upon  which  the  happiness  of  peoples  largely  rests,  and  such  a  book 
could  incidentally  not  fail  to  be  useful  to  civic  society. 

Again,  in  the  same  preface  the  author  says: 

If  my  efforts  in  the  economic  and  cameralistic  sciences  have 
thus  far  received  the  indulgent  favor  of  the  world,  I  do  not  credit 
this  to  my  own  skill.  I  believe  I  owe  it  entirely  to  my  efforts  to  estab- 
lish all  the  theorems  and  rules  upon  the  essential  purpose  of  all 
states,  namely  the  happiness  of  the  peoples.  These  are  also  the 
principles  on  which  I  base  the  financial  treatises  in  this  collection. 
In  fact,  one  can  never  have  other  principles  in  finance.  A  cameralist 
who  bases  his  measures  upon  other  principles  cheats  his  master, 
the  state,  and  himself. 

Examining  these  papers  in  turn,  and  selecting  items  which 

•  The  book  never  appeared. 


JUSTI'S  CAMERALISTIC  MISCELLANIES         461 

are  most  significant  for  our  puq)osc,  we  have  the  following 
details  of  varying  importance: 

A  usage  that  was  common  in  this  period,  not  in  Germany 
alone  but  throughout  Europe,  is  illustrated  in  I,  i,  in  the  em- 
ployment of  the  word  "philosophy"  as  equivalent  to  "science." 
The  main  point  of  I,  2,  is  in  the  paragraph  on  p.  17: 
That  which  is  the  decisive  factor  in  human  affairs  is  "the  allwise 
Providence  of  the  Highest  which  always  has  a  hand  in  human  activi- 
ties and  which  orders  the  outcome  of  all  things  according  to  its  great 
wisdom," 

A  side-light  on  the  application  of  Justi's  theories  to  actual 
conditions  is  in  I,  6: 

Should  sumptuary  laws  be  enacted  in  the  interest  of  the  happi- 
ness of  the  state,  especially  when  it  is  desirable  to  encourage  com- 
merce and  trade?  Of  course  superfluous  display  and  waste  or 
luxury  [Ueppigkeit]  are  contrary  to  the  principles  of  sound  morals. 
What  degree  of  outlay  should  be  regarded  as  extravagant  is  a  ques- 
tion. It  is  not  at  all  certain  that  the  outlays  which  would  harm  a 
single  family  are  for  that  reason  harmful  to  the  whole  state.  For 
strength  against  possible  enemies  the  state  needs  available  means. 
If  money  were  hoarded  by  the  subject,  to  that  extent  the  sources  of 
available  means  would  dry  up.  The  good  of  the  state  demands 
that  money  should  circulate.  If  the  outlays  for  display  and  luxury 
do  not  leave  the  country,  they  are  not  harmful  to  the  state  (p.  80). 
Neither  the  power  of  the  sovereign  nor  the  total  means  of  the  state 
lose  anything  by  it.  Hence  such  outlays  should  not  be  forbidden. 
In  the  case  of  luxurious  consumption  of  foreign  goods,  the  best 
regulation  is  by  prohibiting  import  of  the  same  (p.  89).  Yet 
certain  luxuries  should  perhaps  be  forbidden:  e.  g.,  those  that 
consume  gold  and  silver  in  perishable  ornaments,  or  in  gilding  wood 
or  the  baser  metals.  Probably,  however,  even  the  trades  that  furnish 
these  should  be  allowed  freedom,  as  the  amount  of  gold  and  silver 
permanently  lost  to  the  state  is  trifling  compared  with  the  amounts 
which  craftsmen  are  able  to  earn  in  these  trades. 

The  silver  plate  owned  by  the  upper  classes  is  so  much  dead 
treasure.    It  is  certain  that  this  is  not  contributing  to  the  welfare 


4^2  THE  CAMERALISTS 

of  the  community  [j^etneincs  Wesen],  and  it  is  to  \x  wished  that  this 
sort  of  display  could  be  restricted  (p.  91).  Vet  I  cannot  conclude 
that  possession  of  such  things  should  be  prohibited.  A  special  tax 
on  luxuries  would  be  a  wiser  means  of  restraining  extravagance. 

I,  8,  compares  the  government  of  a  state  to  a  machine,  and 
makes  the  analogy  a  text  for  an  argument  for  strict  ordering 
of  the  civil  service.  I,  11,  enters  the  field  of  social  psychology 
in  this  vein: 

Peoples  are  governed  by  the  help  of  prejudices  [Vorurtheile]. 
The  passions  are  the  first  sources  and  motive  springs  of  all  human 
actions.  If  we  were  controlled  by  reason  only,  we  should  need 
neither  republics  nor  forms  of  government.  The  strength  and 
weakness  of  a  state  depends  accordingly  upon  the  character  of  the 
prejudices  with  which  its  citizens  are  filled,  and  the  wisdom  of  the 
government  consists  chiefly  in  producing  prejudices  by  means  of 
which  the  state  may  attain  to  all  the  possible  power  of  which  it  is 
capable. 

If  ever  there  was  a  people  that  needed  to  change  its  prejudices, 
we  poor  Germans  are  the  ones.  Since  the  Saxon  emperors  (919- 
1024),  our  strength  has  l>een  steadily  on  the  wane,  and  for  two  hun- 
dred years  we  apfx-ar  to  have  Ix^en  the  prey  of  all  neighbboring 
Iji'oples.  Our  prejudices  cannot  be  of  the  sort  that  put  us  in  po.sses- 
sion  of  our  full  strength.  It  is  not  the  least  of  our  lacks  that  we  are 
wanting  in  the  impulse  and  genius  that  are  necessary  for  commerce. 
We  must  change  our  prejudices  so  that  commerce  and  manufacture 
will  rank  higher,  and  will  not  be  l>eneath  the  dignity  of  the  nobility. 
Is  a  nobility  in  general  consistent  with  the  nature  of  republics 
(p.  151)?  A  hereditary  nobility  stops  up  a  source  which  could 
furnish  a  grrat  numlxr  of  rewards  for  services. 

Ju.sti  seems  to  discu.ss  the  question  seriously  (I,  170,  et 
passim)  whether  it  were  not  better  to  give  up  the  idea  of 
developing  commerce  and  to  resume  the  idea  on  which  the  old 
German  nobility  was  based — power  and  hapj)iness  by  conquest. 
The  chief  irlea  would  then  be — not  to  have  a  sufficient  army  to 
repel  attacks,   but  an  aggressive  policy  of  conquest.    This 


JUSTI'S  CAMERALISTIC  MISCELLANIES         463 

would  be  to  turn  the  nation  into  a  robber  among  nations. 
After  referring  to  somewhat  more  admissible  causes  of  war, 
Justi  continues  (p.  175): 

Moreover,  in  our  day  war  is  extremely  costly.  It  is  more  a 
sacrifice  of  unmeasured  sums  of  money  than  of  blood.  If  therefore 
a  poor  nation  should  today  determine  to  make  conquests  its  chief 
purpose,  it  would  come  to  a  very  ridiculous  resolve.  A  people  that 
today  wants  to  be  militant  must  accordingly  also  seek  to  be  rich. 

There  is  no  other  way  whereby  a  people  can  become  rich  than 
through  commerce.  If  a  people  had  in  its  power  the  richest  gold 
mines,  without  carrying  on  flourishing  commerce,  it  would  not  thereby 
be  rich.  Those  foreign  peoples  who  get  control  of  its  commerce 
will  also  indirectly  have  its  gold  mines  in  their  power.  Spain  furnishes 
a  very  conclusive  example. 

Accordingly  no  people  can  today  reasonably  make  conquests 
its  chief  purpose  without  proposing  commerce  as  an  equally  impor- 
tant affair But  let  us  suppose  that  a  militant  folk  has  brought 

all  Europe  under  its  yoke.  Would  it  therefore  be  happy  ?  By  no 
means.  It  would  without  doubt  acquire  vast  plunder,  but  these 
very  riches,  instead  of  promoting  its  happiness,  would  cause  its  ruin. 

All  riches  which  do  not  come  into  the  state  by  way  of  commerce, 
which  do  not  make  the  industry  of  the  citizens  active  in  their  voca- 
tions, and  which  do  not  incidentally  pour  themselves  into  all  parts 
of  the  civic  body,  are  the  source  of  all  disorders,  which  will  presently 
draw  after  them  the  corruption  and  total  destruction  of  the  state. 
Not  the  German  peoples  were  the  real  destroyers  of  Rome,  but  the 
treasures  of  Attalus  (sic)  and  other  riches  which  came  to  Rome 

through  the  plundering  of  so  many  peoples This  destruction 

would  have  been  even  more  rapid  if  the  Romans,  after  their  conquests, 
had  not  become  merchants.  But  even  this  medicine  could  not 
restore  the  humors  once  totally  corrupted.  They  were  only  a  strength  ■ 
ening  by  which  the  wholly  emasculated  body  was  able  to  endure 
for  a  period 

All  this  amply  proves,  it  seems  to  me,  that  a  people  can  never 
make  conquest  its  chief  aim,  and  thereby  promote  its  happiness. 
It  proves  that  no  people  can  be  powerful  without  wealth,  and  con- 


464  THE  CAMERALISTS 

sequently  not  without  commerce,  that  a  people  without  sufficient 
power  would  be  very  foolish  if  it  dreamed  of  conquests,  that  the  othe* 
European  powers  would  soon  enough  make  it  repent  of  its  silly 
idea;  yet,  it  proves  that  if  a  poor  people,  contrary  to  all  probability, 
gained  the  conquests  it  had  desired,  still  without  commerce  it  would 
neither  be  happy,  nor  would  it  be  able  to  retain  the  advantages  it 
had  gained. 

If,  accordingly,  all  this  is  established,  it  naturally  follows  that 
the  militant  origin  of  the  nobility  cannot  be  sufficient  ground  for 
its  devoting  itself  exclusively  to  the  purpose  out  of  which  it  originated. ' 

In  I,  13  (p.  198),  Justi  again  explains  his  doctrine  of  the 
importance  of  the  factor  of  density  of  population  as  a  compo- 
nent of  the  strength  of  a  nation.  In  brief  his  assertion  is  that, 
other  things  being  equal,  a  country  with  a  million  inhabitants 
scattered  over  a  thousand  square  miles  of  territory  is  much 
weaker  than  a  country  of  two  hundred  and  fifty  square  miles, 
with  the  same  population.     He  continues  (p.  199): 

The  more  populous  a  state,  the  more  prosperous  will  be  its  food 
industries  and  trades,  and  the  more  active  will  be  the  circulation  of 
money,  because  all  men  have  need  of  reciprocal  aid  and  of  a  thousand 
kinds  of  necessi  ties  from  each  other.  If  a  state  has  foreign  commerce, 
it  will  constantly  acquire  more  riches,  with  the  greater  number  of 
hands  that  labor  on  the  domestic  products  and  wares.    This  increased 

«  The  whole  foregoing  passage  (I,  175-79),  it  must  be  remembered, 
is  incidental  to  discussion  of  the  question,  What  is  the  relation  of  the 
nobility  to  the  state  and  commerce  ?  The  main  point  in  Justi's  mind 
was  to  establish  the  position  that  on  the  principle,  noblesse  oblige,  a  nobility 
should  justify  itself  by  the  sort  of  service  which  the  state  most  needed. 
His  argument  was  that  war  was  not  the  most  radical  employment  of  the 
state,  that  commerce  went  much  nearer  to  the  roots  of  happiness,  and 
that,  when  promotion  of  commerce  was  needed,  the  nobility  ought  to 
serve  the  state  by  assuming  commercial  responsibilities.  The  context 
does  not  warrant  any  confident  inferences  from  the  passage  in  its  bearings 
upon  mercantilism.  There  are  traces  in  it,  in  the  reference  to  stimulation 
of  domestic  industry,  of  the  actual  association  of  ideas  with  the  more 
fundamental  processes  of  production.  We  find  the  same  cropping  out 
elsewhere  in  qualification  of  the  supposed  extreme  mercantilist  theory. 


JUSTI'S  CAMERALISTIC  MISCELLANIES  465 

wealth  will  always  set  the  industrious  hands  of  ihe  iK)pulation  into 
more  active  motion,  and  the  wealth  of  the  state  will  the  more  increase. 
This  wealth  will  at  the  same  time  attract  much  folk  from  the 
neighboring  states,  that  barely  support  life:  and  thus  this  wealth 
will  increase  the  power  of  the  state.  The  superiority  of  a  people 
depends  today  as  much  and  more  upon  its  wealth  than  upon  its 
numbers.  A  land  which  is  wisely  ruled,  and  has  a  flourishing  sus- 
taining system,  can  accordingly  never  have  too  many  inhabitants. 

A  moral  state  must  look  to  wedlock  for  the  increase  of  its  popula- 
tion. How  important  to  the  state  therefore  are  its  marriage  laws 
(p.  200). 

The  monograph  I,  19,  is  almost  the  modern  "pace-making" 
generalization  which  Professor  W.  I.  Thomas  has  done  so 
much  to  develop.  The  paper  glorifies  the  type  that  we  now 
call  "promoters,"  while  it  denounces  the  merely  adventurous 
varieties  of  the  type.  I,  24,  expands  previous  suggestions 
about  getting  the  most  out  of  people  by  a  system  of  honors. 

Of  the  papers  in  the  second  division  of  Vol.  I  on  financial 
questions,  we  need  note  merely  that  (i)  expands  the  view 
previously  expressed,  that  it  is  better  to  farm  the  Landesherr- 
lichen  Catnmergiiter  und  Aeniter  than  to  administer  them 
directly;  (4)  adds  details  on  wise  forms  of  taxation;  (5)  dis- 
cusses excise,  and  a  proposed  substitute  in  the  form  of  an  occu- 
pation tax;  (6)  gives  further  details  of  the  duties  of  a  cameral- 
ist  in  connection  with  forests  and  forestry;  (7)  elaborates  a 
detail  under  the  same  head;  (8)  expands  the  discussion  of 
the  proposition  that  subjects  are  not  necessarily  happy  by 
reason  of  low  taxes;  (9)  enlarges  on  "  Mauthen  und  Zolle,^^  as 
means  of  promoting  commerce;  (12)  treats  of  taxation  as  a 
means  of  developing  and  managing  the  sustaining  system. 

Passing  to  Vol.  II,  the  first  paper  deals  with  division  and 
balance  of  power  between  the  main  branches  of  the  government 
in  the  fundamental  constitution  of  the  state.  Justi  makes 
two  primary  divisions:   first,  the  law-giving,  second,  the  exec- 


466  THE  CAMERALISTS 

utive  power.  The  former  has  for  its  object  both  the  main 
purpose  of  the  complete  happiness  of  the  state,  and  also  the 
subsidiary  purposes.  Justi  slides  over,  however,  into  the 
conventional  legislative,  executive,  judicial  classification,  and 
a  main  proposition  is  that  neither  all  nor  two  of  these  branches 
of  power  should  be  in  the  same  hands.  The  most  tolerable 
combination  is  that  of  legislative  and  executive  powers  (p.  lo). 

If  the  executive  power  is  entirely  independent  of  the  legislative 
power,  if  the  former  has  at  its  disp)osal  all  necessary  resources,  the 
executive  power  will  certainly  attain  such  preponderance  that  the 
legislative  will  presently  be  suppressed  (p.  12).  Either  it  will  not 
be  convened  at  all,  or  it  will  be  permitted  to  concern  itself  merely 
with  the  most  insignificant  matters.  "In  all  German  nations  legis- 
lation rested  at  first  mostly  with  the  Volk.'"' 

The  paragraph  continues: 

But,  liecause  they'  put  permanently  in  the  hands  of  the  executive 
power,  or  of  their  kings  and  princes,  the  means  of  execution,  namely 
the  revenues  of  the  state,  in  such  a  way  that  the  executive  power 
had  no  more  need  of  their  co-operation,  the  result  was  that  in  Spain 
and  France  nothing  remains  of  the  legislative  power  of  the  Volk, 
and  in  most  of  the  German  states  only  a  bare  shadow.  If  on  the 
other  hand  the  legislative  power  is  entirely  unlimited,  and  not  at  all 
dependent  uyx)n  the  executive  j)Owcr,  the  former  will  presently  abuse 
its  strength  to  supfiress  ihe  executive. 

•  I  imagine  that  such  a  proposition,  even  with  the  explanations 
immediately  to  follow,  was  possible  only  because  of  the  ambiguity  of 
the  term  Volk.  Some  of  the  political  philosophers  of  the  time  could 
interpret  the  personal  ads  of  their  own  ruling  princes  as  constructively 
the  action  of  the  Volk.  That  is,  the  latter  term  carried  a  content  of 
metaphysical  theory.  It  did  not  necessarily  mean  the  "people"  in  an 
unequivocal  democratic  sense. 

^  The  implied  antecedent  of  the  pronoun  is  the  plural  "nations" 
in  the  pre<cding  sentence,  not  the  collective  and  metaphysically  con- 
:irued  noun  Volk.  The  whole  explanation  would  go  to  pieces  under 
analysis. 


JUSTI'S  CAMERALISTIC  MISCELLANIES         467 

The  indubitable  conclusion  is  it  seems  to  me  that  a  well-ordered 
fundamental  constitution  of  the  state  will  be  so  arranged  that  the 
two  highest  powers  will  always  be  in  a  certain  sort  of  interdependence 
or  equilibrium.  This  equilibrium  depends  entirely  on  their  having 
the  right  to  hinder  each  other  when  the  one  or  the  other  goes  too 
far  and  loses  sight  of  the  welfare  of  the  state,  or  tends  to  repudiate  the 
fundamental  constitution.' 

The  true  freedom  of  the  citizen  in  monarchies  would  be  repre- 
sented principally  by  two  circumstances,  viz.,  first,  if  the  laws  were 
so  clear  and  distinct  that  the  decisions  would  be  rather  the  decisions 
of  the  laws  than  of  the  judge;  second,  if  the  accused,  especially  in 
penal  cases,  were  allowed  to  choose  his  own  judges,  or  at  least  to 
reject  so  many  of  them  that  the  remainder  would  seem  to  be  of  his 
own  choosing.* 

Another  passage  occurs  (Vol.  II,  p.  26)  in  which  a  leaning 
toward  the  English  form  of  constitution  is  expressed.  More 
important  than  symptoms  of  this  kind  is  the  touch  of  color 
which  we  find  in  II,  I,  9,  Justi's  inaugural  address  at  the  begin- 

•  As  in  other  passages,  Justi  goes  on  to  speak  of  details  which  would 
enable  the  ruler  to  commit  the  nation  to  policies  that  would  constrain 
the  legislative  power  to  acquiesce — in  the  last  instance  on  the  principle 
"my  country  right  or  wrong."  It  is  not  to  be  denied,  however,  that  Justi's 
theory  in  this  passage  really  in  a  large  measure  anticipates  the  demands 
of  the  constitutionalists  of  the  following  century  {vide  op.  cit.,  pp.  21,  22). 
Yet  his  illustrations  of  acts  which  would  make  an  absolute  sovereign 
into  a  despot  are  far  from  indicating  limitations  that  would  remove  the 
conditions  which  to  the  modern  mind  amount  to  practical  absolutism. 
For  instance,  when  Louis  XIV  declared  his  natural  sons  eligible  to  the 
throne,  and  when  Peter  I  of  Russia  claimed  for  the  crown  the  prerogative 
of  designating  the  successor,  each  was  an  attempt  to  alter  the  constitu- 
tion, and  beyond  the  proper  rights  of  the  unlimited  monarch.  That  is, 
Justi  argued  in  most  cases  for  limitation  of  the  monarch  by  the  con- 
stitution, not  otherwise,  and  the  constitution  which  he  had  in  mind  must 
not  be  thought  of  as  going  into  any  such  details  as  the  written  or  un- 
written constitutions  of  modern  states. 

*  I.  e.,  Justi  had  his  eye  so  closely  trained  on  personal  freedom  that 
he  did  not  properly  estimate  the  degree  of  its  dependence  upon  political 
freedom. 


468  THE  CAMERALISTS 

ning  of  his  professorial  work  at  Vienna.  It  contains  among 
other  things,  an  anticipation  of  the  idea  of  division  of  labor, 
and  the  dependence  of  each  upon  the  labors  of  all,  so  much 
more  minutely  worked  out  by  Adam  Smith. 

The  address  further  glorifies  "republics,"  as  against  the 
fantasy  of  "the  state  of  nature,"  and  is  in  effect  a  plea  for 
acquiescence  in  the  type  of  rule  which  the  House  of  Habsburg 
represented. 

In  the  course  of  the  address,  after  an  outline  of  the  tasks 
that  a  state  must  perform  in  order  to  insure  its  happiness,  a 
passage  occurs  which  is  so  full  of  the  time-temperament 
that  we  are  unwilling  to  weaken  it  by  translation.  It  reads 
(P-  135): 

Ohne  Zweifel,  hochgehiethend^  geheimde  Conferenzminisler, 
und  wirkliche  geJieimde  Rathe,  gnddige  Herren,  wie  auch  hochst  und 
hvchgeehrlesle  Anwesendel  hat  Ihnen  alien  dieser  geringe  Abriss  nur 
Gclcgcnheit  gegel>en,  sich  unterdessen  an  der  geheiligten  Person 
unserer  allerdurchlauchtesten  Monarchin,  eine  welt  wiirdigere  und 
erhalK^ne  Vorstellung  von  der  Sache  zu  machen.  Ich  bin  versi chert, 
dass  sic  unterdessen  in  ihren  Gedanken  diejenigen  weisen  und  uner- 
miidetcn  Bemiihungen  welche  diese  wahrhaftig  grosse  Regentin 
vor  (lie  Wohlfahrt  ihrer  anvertrauten  Volker  anwendet,  an  die  Stelle 
mciner  unzuliinglichen  Beschreibung  gesetzt  haben:  und  was  vor 
einc  wcit  Icbhaftigerc  und  voUkommenere  Abschilderung  ist  ihnen 
nicht  dadurch  gerathen?  Die  osterreichischen  Staaten  haben 
zwar  aliemal  das  Gliick  genossen,  das  ihre  Monarchen  den  anver- 
traulen  7x;ptcr  mit  weiser  Vorsicht,  mit  unermiideter  Sorgfalt,  mit 
eincr  Giitigkeit  ohne  Beyspiele,  und  mit  der  zartlichsten  Licbe 
gcgcn  ihre  Unterthanen  gefuhret  haben.  AUein  die  Hand  des 
unendlichcn  Weltljeherrschers,  wenn  er  es  seiner  allgemeinen  Haus- 
haltung  gemass  Ijefindet,  dass  die  Gestalt  der  2^iten  verandert,  der 
Wuth  der  Verwuster  des  ErdVK)dcns,  die  sich  die  Schwache  ihrer 
Nachbam  zu  Nutzc  machen,  EinhaJt  gethan,  und  die  Ruhe  des 
menschlichcn  Gcschlechts  dargestellet  werden  soil,  bildet  manchmal 
in  dcm  Schoosse  seiner  Vorschung  ausserordentlich  grosse  Seelen, 


JUSTFS  CAMERALISTIC  MISCELLANIES         ^69 

wclche  geschickt  sind,  ein  Reich  auf  einen  viel  hohem  Grad  dcr 
Macht  und  der  GlUckseligkeit  zu  setzen.  Wenn  also  die  gluck- 
lichen  osterreichischen  Lander  ihren  Zepter  jemals  in  weiscn  Handen 
gesehen  haben;  wenn  jemals  die  besten  und  wirksamstcn  Mittel 
ihre  GlUckseligkeit  zu  befordem,  angewendet  worden  sind;  wenn 
sie  sich  jemals  dem  wahren  Punkte  ihrer  Grosse,  Macht  und  GlUck- 
seligkeit genahert  haben:  so  ist  es  itzo,  und  die  gegenwartigen  Zeiten 
werden  das  GlUck  geniessen,  dass  unsere  spa  ten  Enkel  den  Zeitlauf 
von  Oesterreichs  vergrossertem  Zustande  bey  ihnen  anfangen  werden. 

Of  course  this  impossible  fulsomeness  was  largely  a  matter 
of  prescribed  and  perfunctory  form.  It  would  be  absurd  to 
draw  the  conclusions  from  it  which  literal  interpretation  of  the 
language  would  suggest  to  modem  democrats.  At  the  same 
time  the  fact  remains  that  Justi  was  a  pliant  servant  of  a  regime 
which  called  for  that  sort  of  conventionality.  Discount  what- 
ever is  necessary  for  the  demands  of  ceremony;  discount  too 
the  reservations  in  Justi's  mind,  and  betrayed  frequently  in 
his  books;  he  remains  the  spokesman  of  the  type  of  state  of 
which  Maria  Theresia  is  a  symbol.  In  the  remainder  of  the 
address  from  which  the  passage  is  taken  he  employs  rhetoric 
of  almost  equal  extravagance  to  express  his  pride  in  the  vocation 
of  preparing  youth  for  service  in  the  administration  of  the 
Habsburg  state  (p.  137).  When  a  little  later  he  found  himself 
no  longer  persona  grata  in  Vienna,  he  went  from  state  to  state 
of  the  same  essential  type,  and  left  behind  no  credible  evidence 
of  ever  in  his  responsible  moments  having  entertained  the 
thought  that'  in  Germany  an  essentially  different  type  of  state 
was  feasible.  The  relation  of  Justi  to  the  modem  type  of 
political  theory  may  be  indicated  in  a  perfectly  fair  illustration. 
Suppose  that  in  a  hundred  years  Great  Britain  shall  have 
moved  as  far  from  her  present  type  in  the  direction  of  socialism 
as  continental  states,  in  becoming  constitutional,  have  moved 
from  the  absolutistic  type  in  the  direction  of  democracy.  Sup- 
pose that  a  historian  at  that  date  should  take  John  Stuart  Mill's 


470  THE  CAMERALISTS 

rccorrl  in  connection  with  the  lAind  Tenure  Reform  Association 
as  proof  that  he  was  not  a  nineteenth-century  conservative, 
but  a  iwcnty-first  century  radical.  The  guess  would  be  no 
wider  (jf  the  mark  than  an  interpretation  of  Jusli  as  other  than 
a  technologist  of  the  Maria  Theresia  type  of  governmental 
theory. 

In  this  same  address  (p.  142),  in  speaking  of  the  conditions 
which  enable  a  state  to  accomj)lish  its  purj)oses  for  its  citizens, 
Justi  puts  "adequate  riches"  first,  and  "complete  security" 
second,  and  he  continues: 

Wc  must  not,  however,  form  the  same  notion  of  the  riches  of  a 
state  which  we  have  of  the  riches  of  a  private  person.  Not  all  riches 
which  a  land  may  contain  can  be  regarded  as  wealth  [ein  Reichlhum] 
of  the  land.  Not  chests  filled  with  money  in  the  treasury  of  the 
monarch,  not  the  hcaped-up  piles  of  gold  in  the  houses  of  private 
persons,  accumulated  by  greed  and  oppression,  constitute  the  riches 
of  the  state.  Gold  and  silver,  these  lustrous  metals,  which  seem 
so  l>eautiful  to  the  eager  eyes  of  men,  lose  all  price  and  all  worth 
I)reviously  credited  to  them,  and  they  turn  again  to  trifling  parts  of 
the  glol)e,  if  they  lose  their  ultimate  purpose:  namely,  to  be  a  uni- 
versal means  of  determining  the  worth  of  all  other  sorts  of  goods, 
and  to  sen'e  for  the  cstaV^lishment  and  promotion  of  the  business 
of  men.  Only  that  wealth  is  therefore  the  real  wealth  of  the  state 
which  is  grasped  by  the  busy  hands  of  the  inhabitants,  and  is  daily 
moved  from  one  employment  into  another. 

Apparently  Justi  had  to  defend  his  claims  for  the  cameral 
sciences  against  suspicion  of  being  on  a  level  with  alchemy, 
fortune-telling,  etc.  With  changes  of  detail,  his  lot  was  not 
unlike  the  situation  in  which  even  now  sociology  finds  itself 
when  it  presents  its  case  to  representatives  of  the  older  social 
sciences.  Apparently  in  part  to  outflank  this  phase  of  opposi- 
tion to  his  subject  Justi  explained  {op.  cit.,  pp.  155-60)  the 
three  methfKJs  of  obtaining  national  wealth  which  he  assumed 
to  be  worth  considering,  viz.,  (i)  mining;  (2)  commerce; 
(3)  inducing  rich  foreigners  to  become  citizens. 


JUSTFS  CAMERALISTIC  MISCELLANIES         47 1 

The  essay,  "Proof  that  a  Universal  Monarchy  Would  Make 
for  the  Welfare  of  Europe  and  the  Human  Race"  (II,  I,  17), 
was  first  published  anonymously  in  1748.  Justi  acknowledges 
that  it  is  punctured  by  the  consideration  that  there  would  be 
no  assurance  of  a  succession  of  fit  monarchs.  It  amounts 
then  merely  to  a  fancy  picture.  He  meant  it,  however,  as  a 
means  of  expressing  indirectly  certain  opinions  which  could 
not  be  published  unveiled.  In  general,  he  wanted  to  ring 
changes  on  the  idea  that  princes  had  no  right  to  govern  arbi- 
trarily, but  that  right  reason  must  control  them.  He  took 
the  round-about  way  of  arguing  that  it  was  not  necessarily  a 
misfortune  to  subjects  to  have  their  prince  subordinate  to  an 
overlord,  because  he  might  enforce  the  reasonable  principles 
which  might  not  otherwise  prevail. 

Justi  argues  that  the  present  status  quo  of  some  hundred 
and  twenty  ruling  princes  was  regarded  by  the  princes  them- 
selves as  synonymous  with  the  happiness  of  Europe;  but  he 
argued  that  the  personal  preferences  of  these  one  hundred 
and  twenty  are  of  relatively  little  moment  (II,  246). 

This  essay  tends  to  raise  the  suspicion  that  Justi  was  hiuch 
more  of  a  skeptic  in  his  early  manhood  about  the  prevailing 
type  of  government  than  he  found  it  expedient  to  remain.  He 
very  explicitly  declares  that  the  curse  of  Germany  is  its  multi- 
tude of  independent  princes  (II,  257), 

The  last  167  pages  of  Vol.  II  (i.  e.,  406-572)  are  deyoted 
to  a  technically  very  important  monograph  on  causes  of  the 
debasement  of  the  currency,  and  means  of  removing  the  evil. 
The  view  of  gold  and  silver  money  which  Justi  expresses  (II, 
427  flf.)  is  essentially  sound.  The  heading  of  §16  is:  "The 
supreme  power  cannot  arbitrarily  fix  the  price  of  gold  and 
silver."  Again  (§22),  he  says:  "The  conditions  of  European 
states  make  gold  and  silver  necessary  as  the  material  of 
money."  There  were,  just  before  Justi's  time,  "silver  cam- 
paigns" in  Germany.     It  was  claimed  that  the  currency  evils 


472  THE  CAMERALISTS 

were  due  to  the  fact  of  the  unfair  ratio  of  gold  to  silver,  while 
the  ratio  established  by  other  nations  did  not  correspond. 
An  act  of  the  Empire  in  1737  fixed  the  ratio  at  151^^  to  i.  The 
ratio  in  England  and  most  other  countries  at  the  same  time 
was  14^  to  I  (II,  468;  vide  II,  544  ff.). 

Justi  makes  the  coinage  right  a  consequence  of  sovereignty 
over  mines  (II,  472-86).  From  Vol.  Ill  we  gather  the  follow- 
ing:    First,  a  passage  in  the  second  paper  (p.  23): 

To  be  rich  is  to  possess  in  abundance  all  that  is  demanded  for 
the  needs  and  comforts  of  human  life,  just  as  he  who  can  procure 
for  hmself  in  sufficiency  the  comforts  of  life  is  a  well-to-do  man. 
[Wohlhabender].  According  to  the  foregoing  concept,  a  rich  state 
b  the  one  which  has  within  itself  superabundant  provision  for  all 
the  needs  and  comforts  of  life  for  a  dense  population.  A  well-to-do 
or  opulent  state  b  one  which  produces  an  adequate  quantity  of  the 
goods  which  a  dense  population  requires  for  its  needs  and  comforts 
(III,  26). 

In  the  following  pages  Justi  explains  at  length  that  money 
is  not  merely  the  symbol  of  goods,  but  that  it  is  itself  a  "ware." 
"Gold  and  silver  are  in  a  certain  sense  necessary  as  money 
only  in  trade  with  foreign  peoples"  (III,  31). 

If  a  land  fxjssesses  only  one  sort  of  wares,  viz.,  gold  and  silver, 
in  superabundance,  the  surplus  must  be  enormous  if  all  the  needs 
and  comforts  are  to  be  supplied  by  exchange  for  it  to  such  an  extent 
that  the  gold  and  silver  country  will  be  properly  called  rich.  Of 
course  in  such  case  the  price  of  gold  and  silver  in  the  country  would 

be  very  low The  foreign  nations  which  supplied  other  goods 

in  exchange  for  these  metals  would  make  large  profits,  the  metab 
would  go  into  the  foreign  lands,  while  no  surplus  of  goods  would 
remain  in  their  place  to  make  the  land  rich.  Thb  is  the  case  with 
Spanbh  America  (III,  34). 

Another  consequence  of  the  supposed  conditions  b  that  such  a 
land  b  very  thinly  populated  (III,  35). 

All  thb  sufficiently  proves,  in  my  opinion,  that  a  state  which 
produces  a  surplus  of  only  gold  and  silver,  but  not  of  other  goods 


JUSTFS  CAMERALISTIC  MISCELLANIES         473 

demanded  for  the  needs  and  comforts  of  life,  can  never  be  called 
rich.  On  the  other  hand  a  state  is  always  to  be  regarded  as  rich 
which  itself  produces  these  goods  in  abundance.  It  possesses  the 
true  riches  of  nature,  which  are  much  superior  to  those  fanciful  riches 
which  arise  from  the  silent  conventions  of  men.  It  possesses  the 
essential  and  the  thing  itself,  and  needs  not  to  trouble  itself  about 
the  symbols  of  the  same.  It  is  quite  independent  of  other  nations, 
and  need  fear  no  unfortunate  consequences  if  its  commerce  with 
them  is  cut  off.  Indeed,  if  it  pleases  such  a  state,  it  can  terminate 
all  trade  with  other  peoples,  and  enjoy  by  itself  all  happiness  which 
a  wise  government  can  procure. 

We  may  even  assert  that  such  a  state  would  be  truly  rich,  if  not 
a  pound  of  gold  and  silver  were  to  be  found  in  it;  and  such  a  state- 
would  be  able  to  continue  all  its  connection  and  trade  with  neigh- 
boring nations.  This  appears  to  be  a  paradox,  because  gold  and 
silver  are  necessary,  particularly  on  account  of  foreign  trade,  and 
the  relative  wealth  as  compared  with  other  states  has  always  been 
regarded  of  great  importance.  Yet,  since  I  have  considered  the 
matter  more  carefully,  I  find  that  what  I  here  affirm  is  strictly  correct. 

If  it  is  presupposed  that  such  a  state  produces  in  superabundance 
all  the  goods  pertaining  to  the  needs  and  comforts  of  life,  there  will 
certainly  be  many  in  the  number  which  the  neighboring  nations 
do  not  have  in  such  abundance,  which  they  must  constantly  seek 
in  the  state  in  question.  It  is  natural  that  such  a  state,  which  itself 
satisfies  all  the  needs  and  comforts  of  its  people,  requires  few  wares 
from  other  peoples,  and  hence  must  have  the  balance  of  trade  in 
its  favor,  so  that  it  has  to  pay  little  to  other  nations.  Now  let  us 
assume  that  such  a  state  has  no  money  in  circulation,  but  only  paper. 
Sure  enough!  This  paper,  as  the  sole  representative  symbol  for 
which  the  wares  of  this  state  can  be  exchanged,  will  be  eagerly  sought 
by  the  neighboring  nations.  It  is  so  untrue  that  this  paper  will  pass 
at  a  lower  value  than  real  money,  that  in  proportion  to  profit  antici- 
pated a  premium  will  be  paid  for  the  paper  above  the  value  of  the 
gold  that  it  represents.  Thb  is  a  natural  and  familiar  experience 
with  all  paper  money  and  bills  of  exchange  of  a  land  to  which  neigh- 
boring nations  must  pay  more  than  they  collect.  Both  the  govern- 
ment and  the  merchants  and  subjects  of  this  state  will  accordingly 


474  THE  CAMERALISTS 

flo  the  same  and  more  with  their  paper  than  if  they  used  gold  and 
silver  coins  in  their  transactions  with  other  nations  (III,  36  ff.). 

The  third  paper  in  Vol.  Ill  contains  a  translation  of  the 
letter  alleged  to  have  been  written  by  Colbert  to  Louis  XIV 
in  1672,  and  first  published  in  the  Guardian.  It  has  a  scheme 
of  reasf^s  why  the  French  monarch  could  not  subdue  the 
Netherlands.  On  the  general  question  of  the  true  power  of 
states,  the  essay  premises:  The  state  is  not  powerful  because 
of  extensive  territories  (pp.  57  ff.);  nor  because  of  population 
alone  (pp.  60  ff.);  nor  because  of  territories,  plus  population, 
plus  riches  (pp.  62  flF.);  nor  even  because  of  invincible  armies 
(pp.  65  fif.),  with  frequent  and  strong  fortifications  (pp.  73  flf.). 

Then  the  positive  doctrine  follows: 

The  true  strength  and  ixjwcr  of  a  state  rests  entirely  upon  the 
wisdom  and  completeness  \V ollkommcnheit]  of  the  government 
(p.  74V  This  ihcorcm  involves  very  much.  It  means  not  only 
ihat  'he  whole  correlation  and  fundamental  constitution  of  the  state 
i.^  K'K)d;  but  the  wisdom  of  the  government  must  display  itself  in  all 

parts  of  the  civic  body;  and  it  must  neglect  no  kind  of  affairs 

\  state  W\\\  always  be  powerful  in  the  degree  in  which  its  govern- 
ment is  completely  organized  [eingerichkt]  and  wisely  exercised; 
and  of  two  states,  equal  to  each  other  in  population  and  riches,  that 
one  will  always  overcome  the  other  the  government  of  which  is  the 
wi.ser  and  more  complete  (p.  74). 

The  development  or  justification  of  the  theorem,  which 
Justi  says  will  be  new  to  many,  is  virtually  a  glorification  of 
cameralism  as  the  technique  of  a  wise  and  complete  govern- 
ment; although  Justi  admits  that  all  lands  are  not  to  be  gov- 
erned in  the  same  way. 

In  the  sixth  essay  of  the  same  volume,  Justi  schedules  the 
services  of  religion  to  the  state.  In  brief  these  are:  (i)  It 
may  stimulate  the  citizens  to  cultivate  the  soil,  and  to  increase 
the  population.  In  this  respect  Catholicism  is  pronounced 
least  efficient   (p.    147);    (2)  it  may   promote  diligence  and 


JUSTI'S  CAMERALISTIC  MISCELLANIES         475 

skill  (p.  151);   (3)  it  may  promote  civic  virtues  and  stimulate 
people  to  practice  them  (161). 

Justi  proceeds  to  consider  the  relation  of  Christianity  in 
particular  to  these  services  (pp.  169  ff.),  and  he  does  not  think 
that  this  religion  is  well  fitted  to  be  the  dominant  force  in  the 
state  because: 

It  is  entirely  heavenly,  entirely  spiritual,  entirely  devoted  to  God, 
entirely  withdrawn  from  this  temporal  life,  and  dedicated  alone  to 
the  future  life.  It  is  all  too  passive,  patient,  humble,  with  respect 
to  the  earthly  life,  and  so  strongly  and  openly  despises  everything 
which  constitutes  the  welfare  of  ciiizens,  that  a  civic  constitution 
could  not  be  maintained  among  other  powers  by  true  Christians 
only  (p.   170). 

The  first  paper  in  the  second  division  of  the  volume,  a 
prospectus  of  the  economic  courses  to  be  offered  at  Gottingen, 
is  dated  June  20,  1755.  It  has  the  following  variation  of 
scientific  classification : 

The  sciences  either  contribute  something  directly  to  the  discharge 
of  our  duties  and  the  improvement  of  our  external  condition  or 
they  serve  those  purposes  indirectly,  and  put  us  in  a  condition  better 
to  fulfil  our  duties;  or  they  are  merely  capable  of  amusing  our 
immortal  soul  (p.  222). 

The  economic  and  cameralistic  sciences  are  those  which  teach 
management  on  a  large  scale  with  the  means  of  the  state,  or  which 
put  us  in  possession  of  the  measures  by  which  the  general  means  of 
the  republic  may  be  preserved,  increased,  and  reasonably  applied  to 
its  ultimate  purpose  of  happiness  (p.  223). 

One  of  the  impressions  which  the  paper  makes,  from  our 
point  of  view,  is  that  Justi  was  beginning  to  increase  his  atten- 
tion to  the  economic  emphasis,  and  second,  that  the  presump- 
tion of  the  prime  and  necessary  first  claim  of  the  stale  was 
still  decisive. 

Justi  urges  that  the  cameralistic  sciences  belong  in  the  first 
of  the  three  groups  just  distinguished.     He  calls  attention  to 


476  THE  CAMERALISTS 

the  lively  movement  at  the  time  in  favor  of  getting  these  sub- 
jects taught  in  the  universities  (p.  226);  and  he  repeats  his 
frequent  reflection  that,  until  recently,  the  learned  were  simply 
engaged  in  exchanging  esoteric  views  with  one  another,  chiefly 
in  a  language  not  understood  by  the  people,  instead  of  doing 
something  that  would  be  of  service  to  the  general  good.^ 

In  the  sixth  paper  of  the  second  division  there  is  discussion 
of  problems  of  state  revenues  with  respect  to  different  circum- 
stances of  states  and  forms  of  government.  In  the  seventh 
paper  an  open  secret  of  the  cameralistic  regime  is  confessed  in 
this  wise: 

The  distribution  and  direction  of  the  means  of  private  persons 
belong,  to  be  sure,  among  the  subjects  which  demand  the  special 
care  of  the  government.  If  the  government  could  bring  it  about 
that  no  citizen  or  resident  should  become  entirely  inpoverished,  it 
would  thereby  perform  a  service  of  the  highest  importance  to  the 
welfare  of  the  state.  Ancient  governments  looked  out  for  this. 
Modem  governments  have  neglected  it  almost  completely.  It  has 
Ijecn  taken  for  granted  that  it  was  entirely  a  matter  of  indifference 
for  the  state  whose  hands  held  the  means  and  the  wealth,  if  they 
were  only  present  and  remained  in  the  country.  The  contrary  is 
true  wisdom. 

Special  and  peculiar  measures  are  demanded  of  the  government 
in  the  case  of  movable  and  immovable  wealth  respectively.  Movable 
goods  are  fruits  of  diligence  and  skill  (p.  343).  It  is  wisdom  for  the 
state  to  add  its  encouragement  in  every  way  to  stimulate  diligence 
and  skill.  Immovable  goods,  on  the  other  hand,  belong  to  the  total 
means  of  the  state,  and  the  means  of  a  state  is  the  chief  ground  of 
its  energies,  its  strength,  and  its  power  [Krafle,  Starke  und  Macht]. 

I  An  explanation  which  occurs  on  p.  343  confirms  and  partially 
explains  a  detail  of  our  knowledge  of  Justi's  personal  history,  viz.:  "Sr. 
Konigliche  Majestat  von  Grossbritannien  und  Churfurstl.  Durchl.  zu 
Braunschweig-Liineburg  haben  allergnadigst  geruhet  mich  iti  diesem 
beriihmten  Musensitze  als  Dero  Oberpoliceycommisarium  zu  bestellen, 

etc zugleich  ....  Erlaubniss  ertheilet  in  den  Oeconomischen 

und  Cameral  Wisscnschaften  ....  Vorlesungen  zu  halten." 


JUSTI'S  CAMERALISTIC  MISCELLANIES         477 

It  cannot  thus  be  a  maUer  of  indifference  to  the  state  whether  this 
portion  of  its  total  means,  which  is  in  the  hands  of  private  persons, 
is  in  good  or  bad  condition,  or  whether  it  is  well  or  ill  employed. 
....  The  use  and  the  good  condition  of  private  estates,  however, 
rests  to  a  great  extent  upon  the  direction  of  a  wise  government  over 
the  same,  and  upon  the  proper  proportion  and  distribution  of  private 

estates  in  the  country If  the  movable  goods  belong,  so  to 

speak,  to  the  whole  world,  and  circulate  from  one  country  into 
another,  the  immovable  goods  are  the  real  fixed  and  assured  prop- 
erty [Eigenthum]  of  the  state.  They  are  the  terra  firma  [Grund  und 
Boden]  of  the  Volk,  because  they  belong  to  the  country  which  pecul- 
iarly pertains  to  the  total  Volk  (p.  358).' 

As  a  primary  principle,  government  must  see  that  lands  shall 
be  in  the  possession  of  those  who  will  live  on  them  and  cultivate 
them  (p.  359).  It  is  also  desirable  that  the  peasants  shall  have  a 
proprietary  tenure  (p.  362).  This  will  tend  to  increase  the  rural 
population  (p.  366). 

In  the  eighth  paper  in  the  second  division  Justi  tries  to  make 
his  views  about  population  as  emphatic  as  possible.  He  says 
(P-  379): 

If  one  should  ask  me  whether  the  chief  consideration  of  a  genuine 
and  wise  cameralist — to  which,  according  to  the  general  principle 
of  the  happiness  of  the  state,  his  chief  care  must  be  directed,  and 
back  to  which  he  must  refer  in  all  his  measures  and  operations — 
could  be  expressed  with  a  single  word  and  concept,  I  would  without 
a  moment's  hesitation  cry  out  the  word  POPULATION.  Yes!  Truly! 
POPULATION  must  be  the  apple  of  his  eye,  as  compared  with  all  other 
measures.' 

'  The  form  of  expression  in  the  last  sentence  has  a  bearing  on  the 
sense  in  which  Justi  thought  of  Volk,  i.  e.,  not  in  the  ordinary  modern 
distributive  sense,  but  as  a  more  artificial  collective  concept. 

'  VideGrundriss der  Policey-Wissenschaft,  p.  77  {vide  above,  p.  444), 
and  von  Mohl,  Gesch.  u.  Lit.  d.  Staatswis.,  Ill,  471.  Von  Mohl  quotes 
the  second  edition.  I  have  referred  to  the  corresponding  passage  in  the 
third.  It  is  very  evident  that  von  Mohl  had  practically  no  knowledge 
of  the  setting  of  the  doctrine  of  population  in  Justi's  system.     In  fact, 


478  THE  CAMERALISTS 

Many  camcralists  who  glance  at  this  monograph  will  certainly 
not  have  expected  this  word.  If  they  had  been  asked  for  such  a 
leading  concept,  they  would  certainly  have  called  out  in  the  loudest 
voice:  monkyI  revenues!  ''plus!"  or  something  of  that  sort. 
Most  of  them  are  so  entirely  convinced  that  the  whole  reason  for 
their  existence  is  to  bring  together  money,  or  revenues,  that  all 
the  philosophers  in  the  world  could  not  convince  them  otherwise. 
I  am  not  now  writing  for  these  people.  I  will  at  this  point  attempt 
to  convince  only  those  cameralists  who,  along  with  a  good  head,  have 
also  a  good  heart,  that  money  and  revenues  should  at  least  be  only 
their  second  great  aim,  if  they  are  not  to  fail  of  both  population  and 
revenues  (p.  379). 

Someone  will  perhaps  reply  that  my  theorem  might  lead  too 
far.  It  might  be  possible  for  a  land  to  be  very  well  populated,  and 
to  have  a  surplus  of  all  goods  required  for  the  need  and  comfort  of 
human  life,  while  still  lacking  money;  or  gold  and  silver,  and  con- 
sequently to  be  poor  in  comparison  with  other  states,  as  a  result  of 
which  it  would  be  exposed  to  various  harmful  consequences.  We 
must  therefore  conclude  that  riches  in  gold  and  silver,  if  not  more 
neces.sary  than  population,  are  still  equally  necessary,  and  thus 
deser\e  equal  attention. 

I  reply:  If  a  country  possesses  a  surplus  of  all  sorts  of  goods, 
and  therewith  the  true  riches,  there  is  scarcely  a  possibility  that  it 
can  suffer  a  lack  of  the  representative  signs  of  goods,  namely  gold 
and  silver.  The  signs  automatically  follow  the  thing  which  they 
represent.  The  surplus  of  goods  in  this  country  will  stimulate  other 
nations  to  exchange  the  same  among  us  for  the  representative  signs, 
l>ecause  the  goods  will  be  cheap  among  us,  and  the  quantity  of  gold  in 
the  country  will  presently  be  in  proportion  to  the  quantity  of  money.' 

he  qualified  it  sufficiently  to  make  von  Mohl's  criticism  gratuitous.  He 
no  more  believed  that  population  could  be  fed  in  unlimited  numbers 
than  Malthus  did.  For  the  practical  purposes  of  the  states  in  whose 
interest  he  was  elaborating  a  technique,  population  was  tlie  first  consid- 
eration, until,  as  he  indicated  in  Staatswirthschaft,  population  should 
reach  three,  four,  or  six  times  the  number  at  his  time.  He  never 
formulated  the  more  general  Malthusian  problem  of  population. 
«  The  last  word  is  apparently  a  misprint  for  goods. 


JUSTI'S  CAMERALISTIC  MISCELLANIES         479 

We  have  no  instance  of  a  country  with  a  great  surplus  of  goods, 
which  was  still  poor  in  money,  provided  that  such  a  country  carried 
on  commerce  with  other  peoples.  On  the  other  hand,  we  have 
examples  of  countries  which  possessed  the  richest  silver  and  gold 
deposits,  and  still  were  very  poor  in  the  goods  of  life,  and  thus  in  the 
true  riches.  The  representative  signs  at  once  followed  the  thing, 
they  entered  the  country  which  had  the  surplus  of  the  goods  of  life, 
and  such  a  (gold-producing)  country  remained  poor  in  spite  of  its 
gold  mines. 

Justi's  opponents  in  the  above  argument  are  men  of  straw 
so  far  as  evidence  appears  in  the  cameralistic  books.  He 
must  have  had  in  mind  cameralists  of  the  bureau,  men  of 
afifairs  rather  than  of  theory,  who  wanted  policies  to  be  shaped 
according  to  the  contrary  hypothesis.  In  the  next  paragraph 
(p.  385)  Justi  continues: 

But  suppose  that  a  well-populated  land,  supplied  with  a  surplus 
of  goods,  has  not  an  adequate  proportion  of  the  "representative 
signs"  in  gold  and  silver.  This  would  be  a  very  slight  disadvantage. 
In  the  country  itself  it  would  have  not  the  ♦slightest  harmful  effect. 
In  respect  to  domestic  circulation  [Umlauf]  the  proportion  of  money 
in  the  country  is  wholly  indifferent.  If  the  land  is  only  well  populated 
and  has  a  surplus  of  goods,  exchange  will  be  as  lively  with  little  money 
as  with  much.  Indeed,  it  may  be  dispensed  with  entirely.  Such  a 
country  could,  without  money,  have  all  the  happiness  and  strength 
of  which  it  is  capable.' 

Then  Justi  goes  on  to  say  (p.  386)  that  of  course  the  quan- 
tity of  money  becomes  imi)ortant  so  soon  as  we  consider  rela- 
tions with  other  states.  That  is,  it  is  important  chiefly  when 
a  state  is  in  an  aggressive  attitude  toward  others,  and  its  policy 
is  to  harm  them. 

'  This  passage  is  notable  as  proof  that  Justi  was  not  the  sort  of 
mercantilist  described  as  the  traditional  type.  The  naivete  of  his  ideas 
about  the  relative  importance  of  a  circulating  medium  is  to  be  noted,  but 
it  does  not  immediately  concern  our  purpose,  except  that  it  was  a  very 
natural  incident  of  his  predominantly  administrative  conception  of  the 
state. 


48q  the  cameralists 

The  true  relative  defensive  strength  of  a  country  depends  always 
upon  the  larger  population,  other  things  being  equal;  although  the 
relative  aggressive  power  depends  more  upon  wealth  in  gold  and 
tilver;  or  at  least  the  relative  wealth  has  in  this  connection  the  most 
efifect. 

In  the  following  pages  (pp.  387  flf.)  Justi  resumes  his  main 
line  of  argument  on  population,  and  elaborates  rules  for 
encouraging  a  high  birth  rate.  These  are:  (i)  Means  of  earn- 
ing a  living  must  be  made  abundant;  (2)  the  government 
must  not  be  oppressive;  (3)  the  laws  must  encourage  marriage; 
(4)  the  chief  means  of  promotion  is  that  the  rights  of  the  pater 
famUias  and  of  the  husband,  namely  the  lordship  over  his 
house  and  his  wife,  which  so  undoubtedly  belongs  to  him 
according  to  the  law  of  nature  and  of  civic  society,  should  be 
restored  (p.  393 ;  vide  Natur  und  Wesen  der  Staaten,  8.  Haupt- 
siUck,  §§240,  241);^  (5)  the  state  must  exercise  great  care  over 
the  education  of  poor  children,  and  the  training  of  children 
in  general  (p.  395). 

The  remaining  papers  in  the  collection  are  so  strictly  tech- 
nical that  they  add  nothing  to  our  knowledge  of  Justi's  more 
fundamental  reasoning. 

<  It  is  more  than  possible  that  the  first  Frau  Justi  may  have  had  a 
mind  of  her  own  at  this  point,  and  that  the  domestic  troubles  of  the 
house  of  Justi  may  have  turned  on  this  issue. 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

THE  CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS 
("INTRODUCTION") 

The  reasons  for  treating  Sonnenfels  as  the  last  in  the  camera- 
listic  series  must  be  reserved  for  a  later  volume.  More  con- 
ventional usage  extends  the  present  group  to  the  time  of  Rau.' 
This  summary  measure  of  convenience  is  possible  only  by 
ignoring  the  essential  distinctions  of  purpose  which  distinguish 
theorists  of  successive  periods. 

Roscher  divides  the  history  of  German  economic  theory 
into  three  great  periods:  First,  the  theologico-humanistk, 
from  the  early  humanists  to  the  end  of  the  Thirty  Years'  War; 
second,  the  " polizeUich-cameralisHsche"  to  which  no  date  of 
expiration  is  assigned;  third,  the  scientific,  for  which  no  dis- 
tinct birthday  is  designated,  but  the  implication  is  that  it  begins 
with  the  favorable  reception  of  physiocratic  doctrines  in  Ger- 
many, that  is,  during  the  last  quarter  of  the  eighteenth  century. 
As  divisions  of  this  sort  are  mere  uncritical  superficialities  at 
best,  we  need  waste  no  time  upon  them,  after  pointing  out 
that  they  are  worthless  for  purposes  of  precision.  They  magnify 
accidentals,  instead  of  penetrating  first  to  the  purposes  which 
are  the  ultimate  marks  of  distinction  between  theorists,  and 
second,  to  the  methodologies  which  are  the  variants  of  their 
procedure. 

If  we  compare  Roscher's  main  analysis  with  the  titles  of 
his  subdivisions,  we  find  that  he  falls  back  upon  a  collection  of 
uncorrected  characterizations  after  all.  For  example,  he  treats 
Dithmar,  Gasser,  Zincke,  and  Justi,  with  others  of  lesser  note 
or  of  equal  importance  if  studied  primarily  in  relation  to  their 
proper  groups,  under  the  subtitle,  *^ihe  older  eclectics  of  the 

^Lehrbuch  der  politischen  Oeconomie,  1826,  etc. 

481 


482  THE  CAMERALISTS 

eighteenth  century.**^  He  makes  a  subdivision  under  the 
*' scientific  period,"  for  Sonncnfels,  with  two  or  three  others 
of  trifling  consequence  thrown  in  to  keep  up  appearances, 
with  the  label,  "the  later  absolutistic  eclectics."*  This  all 
amounts  to  the  veriest  parody  of  analysis.  Roscher  gravely 
declares  that  in  the  period  from  the  predominance  of  Wolfif 
to  the  influence  of  Kant  all  German  philosophy  was  eclecticism, 
and  at  the  same  time  national  economy,  from  the  end  of  the 
Seven  Years'  War  to  the  outbreak  of  the  French  Revolution, 
was  predominantly  eclectic.  We  should  say  rather  that 
"national  economy"  was  still  what  it  had  been  for  two  hundred 
years,  an  increasingly  circumstantial  and  subdivided  technology 
of  management  of  the  state,  considered  as  the  patriarchate  of 
the  prince,  and  that  it  was  no  more  eclectic  in  principle  than  it 
had  been  from  the  beginning.  It  is  always  uncertain  whether 
Roscher's  term  ^' Nationalokonomik"  amounts  to  anything 
more  than  a  synonym  for  Justi's  "Staatswirthscfiaft.''  If 
Roscher  meant  to  imply  that  there  was  in  Germany,  at  the 
period  designated,  an  economic  science  of  any  sort  differen- 
tiated from  the  general  system  of  civic  management,  in  which 
the  power  of  the  government  was  the  decisive  aim,  no  evidence 
appears  that  the  wish  was  not  father  to  the  thought.  In  this 
period,  and  notably  in  Sonnenfels,  a  new  spirit  is  evident. 
The  more  obvious  and  extreme  corollaries  of  quasi-absolutism 
are  challenged,  indirectly  at  any  rate,  by  sentimental  rather 
than  formulated  variants  consisting  of  higher  valuations  of 
the  claims  of  citizens  as  such,  in  contrast  with  the  older  pre- 
sumption that  whatever  the  supposed  good  of  the  government 
demanded  must  as  a  matter  of  course  prescribe  the  terms  of 
individuals'  rights. 

Yet  Roscher  is  correct  in  a  way  when  he  continues: 
In  such  a  time  criticism  is  far  from  serious  examination  of  funda- 
mental ideas.    It  is  rather  busy  rubbing  down  the  sharp  points, 
«  Roscher,  op.  cU.,  pp.  430  £f.  »  Op.  cit.,  pp.  533  ff. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  483 

reconciling  petty  contradictions;  that  is,  it  is  essentially  eclectic. 
Before  the  discussion  of  the  Smithian  system,  all  the  German  teachers 
oipub]icma.naigemcnt[Volkstuirthschaft]f  the  apostles  of  physiocracy 
and  the  historical-conservative  opponents  of  the  new  spirit  excepted, 
may  be  classed  in  two  groups — absolutistic  and  liberal  eclectics,  the 
former  attached  to  the  two  major  German  powers,  especially  Austria, 
the  latter  to  the  medium  and  petty  states  of  North  Germany,  par- 
ticularly the  Hanse  cities. 

For  more  than  two  generations  Austrian  national  economy  was 
dominated  by  Joseph  von  Sonnenfels  (1733-1817).  He  undertook 
his  professorship  of  Finanz-  und  PoliceituissenscJiaft  at  Vienna  in 
1763.  His  significant  literary  influence  began  still  earlier,  and  a 
little  later  his  political  importance.  The  latter  constantly  grew  under 
Joseph  II.  In  the  troubled  times  of  the  French  Revolution  it  encoun- 
tered opposition,  but  on  the  whole  it  maintained  itself  so  long  that 
until  the  publication  of  his  own  handbook  in  1845  Kudler  followed 
the  tradition  of  making  Sonnenfels'  works  the  basis  of  his  lectures. 
This,  to  be  sure,  does  not  speak  well  for  the  intellectual  produc- 
tivity of  Austria,  and  the  fact  is  that  the  country  had  to  rely  largely 
on  thinkers  from  the  other  German  states. 

Sonnenfels  was  the  grandson  of  a  Berlin  rabbi.  His  father 
moved  to  Austria,  submitted  to  baptism,  and  assumed  the  name 
Sonnenfels.  He  was  a  pioneer  of  German  culture  in  Austria,  and 
some  of  his  experiences  remind  one  of  the  reception  which  Adam 
Smith  found  in  Scotland  for  the  Oxford  English  which  he  had  acquired 
during  his  university  residence.' 

Of  Sonnenfels  the  younger,  Roscher  further  says: 

His  general  political  view  is  a  theoretical  and  insecurely  founded 
absolutism,  mitigated  by  the  sort  of  philanthropic  ideas  which  were 
prevalent  in  the  second  half  of  the  eighteenth  century.  In  a  mono- 
graph dedicated  to  Maria  Theresia  (1771)  and  entitled  "On  Love 
of  the  Fatherland,"  he  has  much  to  say  about  monarchy,  aristocracy, 
and  democracy,  but  with  express  adherence  to  the  words  of  Pope, 

For  fomis  of  government  let  fools  contest, 
The  best  administered  is  the  best. 

*  Op.  cit.,  p.  534,  n. 


484  THE  CAMERALISTS 

He  explains  the  origin  of  the  state  in  the  sense  of  Rousseau,  and  the 
mottoes  of  all  three  volumes  of  his  chief  work  were  taken  from 
Rousseau.'  At  the  same  time  he  declares  that  the  natural  condition 
of  men  is  the  social  condition,  and  following  Rousseau's  own  words, 
to  be  sure,  he  compared  the  state  with  the  organism  of  the  human 
body.  Meanwhile,  because  "irresistibility  is  the  most  essential  trait 
of  the  sovereign  power,  the  governments  nominated  by  the  aggregate 
will  are  as  unlimited  as  the  will  was  whose  place  they  have  taken." 
Religion  itself  is  by  no  means  a  positive  limitation  of  the  will  of  the 
ruler.  It  is  conceived  rather  quite  in  the  sense  of  Joseph  II,  as  a 
guiding  thread  in  the  hand  of  the  ruler,  which  the  latter  should  never 
neglect,  and  which  was  especially  necessary  in  dealing  with  ordinary 
people.  Freethinking  is  also  politically  a  crime,  and  there  is  no  ground 
for  the  fear  that  attachment  to  the  laws  of  society  could  ever  harm 
'religion  and  morality.  Sonneftfels  calls  the  censorship  of  books 
one  of  the  most  necessary  police  regulations.  He  urges  the  shorten- 
ing of  processes  before  the  courts,  and  the  payment  of  advocates 
by  the  state:  thus  impressing  the  most  natural  and  expert  organ  of 
the  opposition  into  the  service  of  the  government.  A  favorite  idea 
of  Sonnenfels  was  that  in  criminal  cases  the  penalty  of  ascertained 
guilt  should  be  determined  by  the  vote  of  the  majority  cff  the  judges; 
the  question  of  guilt  or  innocence  however,  as  well  as  of  the  mitigating 
or  aggravating  circumstances,  should  be  settled  only  by  a  unanimous 
vote.  In  practice  this  proposition  would  in  most  cases  simply  lead 
to  the  release  of  the  accused. 

On  the  other  hand,  Sonnenfels  gained  a  reputation  in  Austria 
for  his  efforts  to  abolish  torture.*  This  reform  was  decided  in  1775 
by  the  publication  of  a  tract  which  was  at  the  same  time  in  defiance 
of  a  decree  of  1769  against  "all  too  great  freedom  in  writing,"  the 

»  This  is  only  partially  true  of  the  fifth  edition,  which  I  have  used. 
Roscher  cites  the  third.  The  motto  of  the  fifth  edition  of  Vol.  I  is  from 
Cicero,  De  divin.  i-iii,  and  on  the  page  opposite  the  beginning  of  the 
General  Introduction,  is  a  paragraph  from  Richard  Hey,  Observations 
OH  the  Nature  of  Civil  Liberty.  The  motto  of  the  third  volume  is  from 
Horace;  while  only  the  second  takes  its  motto  from  Rousseau. 

*  Among  the  more  creditable  facts  about  Becher  is  his  adhesion 
to  the  same  view.     {Vide  Roscher,  loc.  cU.,  p.  384,  n.  a.) 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  485 

same  being  occasioned  by  his  publications  on  the  death  penalty 
and  torture.  Sonnenfels  also  opposed  treatment  of  the  pensions  of 
civic  servants  as  charity.  Again  his  curt  demand  that  every  obso- 
lete law  should  be  repealed,  ran  counter  to  a  well-known  maximum  of 
despotism  according  to  which  the  ruler  is  never  to  admit  that  he  has 
erred,  and  reserves  the  choice  between  various  fundamental  prin- 
ciples in  dealing  with  a  specific  case.  That  in  the  case  of  every  law 
the  purposes  of  the  law-giver  should  be  discussed  so  as  to  protect 
right  principles,  is  much  more  emphatically  urged  by  Sonnenfels 
than  by  Justi. 

At  the  same  time,  it  is  characteristic  of  Sonnenfels'  absolutism 
to  be  more  liberal  at  the  expense  of  private  rights  than  at  the  expense 
of  governmental  power.  Thus  in  the  case  of  the  obligations  at- 
tached to  peasant  holdings  of  the  soil,  he  speaks,  for  example,  of 
the  ancient  imprescriptible  human  rights,  in  contrast  with  the  tra- 
ditional rights  of  possession.' 

The  foregoing  passage  from  Roscher  has  been  cited  not  for 
its  value  as  an  interpretation  of  Sonnenfels,  but  as  a  commen- 
tary on  Roscher's  use  of  the  term  eclectic.  The  details  recited 
furnish  a  content  for  the  word  as  he  employed  it.  This  usage 
is  to  be  distinguished  from  another  which  to  some  minds  at 
least  is  more  appropriate.  That  is,  we  understand  by  eclecti- 
cism an  attempt  to  construct  a  system  of  thought  by  combina- 
tion of  two  or  more  systems  which  are  held  by  their  extreme 
adherents  to  be  mutually  exclusive,  as  for  instance  the  Kantian 
psychology  and  the  Benthamite  ethics."  According  to  Roscher's 
specifications,  he  meant  by  eclecticism  a  certain  degree  of  inde- 
pendence in  deciding  whether  traditional  conclusions  about 
details  necessarily  follow  from  principles  still  regarded  as  funda- 
mental. It  is  in  the  latter  sense  alone  that  Sonnenfels  can  be 
called  an  eclectic.  It  is  not  true  that  he  was  a  mediator  between 
the  traditional  philosophy  of  quasi-absolutism  and  a  rival 
political  philosophy.   It  is  true  that  his  attempts  to  mitigate  the 

*  Vide  Handlung,  $te  Aujl.,  p.  53;  vide  below,  p.  549. 

*  Vide  Century  Dictionary,  title  "  Eclectic."  II. 


4^6  THE  CAMERALISTS 

consequences  of  quasi-absolutism  must  be  read  at  this  dis- 
tance as  clear  signs  that  a  new  thought-era  was  in  the  making. 
The  times  were  ripening  for  a  system  of  political  philosophy 
which  would  openly  challenge  tradition.  Specific  valuations 
were  forming  in  men's  minds  which  would  presently  amount 
to  repudiation  of  the  old  general  theory.  The  reconstruction, 
however,  in  the  case  of  men  like  Sonnenfels,  had  gone  only 
so  far  as  to  produe  a  half-conscious  conflict  between  the  cogni- 
tive and  the  emotional  sides  of  political  judgments.  To  put 
it  in  paradox,  Sonnenfels  thought  as  an  absolutist,  hut  he  felt 
as  a  democrat.  Like  every  other  parado.x,  this  is  a  very  loose 
statement.  It  more  correctly  characterizes  the  brea king-up 
process  of  which  Sonnenfels  was  an  index  than  any  label  which 
purports  to  assign  him  a  precise  position  in  a  schematic  classi- 
fication of  theorists.  The  justice  of  this  dissent  from  Roscher 
will  appear  as  we  deal  directly  with  Sonnenfels. 

The  work  which  is  most  important  for  our  purpose,  as 
reflecting,  so  to  speak,  a  fin  de  sikcle  phase  of  cameralism,  is 
in  three  volumes,  entitled,  Grunds&lze  der  Policey,  Handlung 
und  Finanz.^  The  volumes  are  closely  related,  but  each  is 
a  distinct  unit,  devoted  respectively  Vol.  I  to  Policey,  Vol.  II 
to  Handlung,  Vol.  Ill  to  Finanz.  According  to  the  author's 
explanation  in  the  Preface  to  Vol.  I,  the  books  were  what  we 
should  now  call  syllabi  of  the  courses  which  he  gave  in  the  uni- 
sity  at  Vienna  on  the  corresponding  subjects.  This  description 
must  be  commented  upon  further  in  connection  with  the 
several  volumes. 

A  single  observation  should  precede  analysis  of  these  books, 
viz.:  One  feels  in  passing  from  Justi  to  Sonnenfels  that  a 
watershed  has  been  crossed,  and  that  one  is  within  the  borders 

'  The  title-page  has  the  further  legend,  "Z«  don;  Leil/aden  des 
politischen  Studiutns."  The  center  of  the  page  is  occupied  by  a  vignette 
of  Montesquieu,  in  itself  a  critical  index  of  first-rate  imp)ortance.  The 
first  edition  was  published  in  1765.   I  have  used  only  the  fifth  edition,  1787. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  487 

of  another  territory.  Speaking  literally,  the  mere  fact  that 
Sonnenfels  makes  the  conscious  attempt  at  modernism  in- 
volved in  adopting  a  corrected  orthography  makes  the  reader 
aware  of  a  transition.  Typographically  these  volumes  are 
not  an  improvement  upon  the  mechanical  style  of  Justi's 
publications.  In  their  contents  one  detects  a  somewhat  freer 
spirit.  Judging  wholly  from  the  internal  evidence,  one  would 
by  no  means  rank  Sonnenfels  as  Justi's  equal  in  intellectual 
strength.  The  later  writer  appears  to  have  been  of  a  more 
receptive  than  creative  type,  but  although  they  were  in  part 
contemporaries  the  impressions  which  molded  him  contained 
elements  which  were  less  active  in  Justi's  world.  If  one  were 
called  upon  to  defend  this  estimate,  it  might  be  said  that  while 
Justi  seems  to  have  been  intellectually  more  virile,  he  seems 
also  to  have  been  less  open  to  persuasion  by  the  comparison  of 
moral  values.  Justi's  personality  betrays  some  of  the  signs  of 
quasi-absolutism  at  its  worst.  Sonnenfels  shows  affinities  for 
something  superior  to  quasi-absolutism  at  its  best.  In  spite  of 
this  contrast,  we  should  go  astray  if  we  followed  the  example 
of  Roscher  in  affixing  a  distinctive  label  to  Sonnenfels.  We 
cannot  make  such  men  fit  into  any  schematic  classification. 
They  show  that  a  new  type  was  in  the  process  of  evolution. 
They  do  not  quite  correspond  with  any  general  description  or 
definition.  They  are  not  entirely  consistent  with  themselves. 
They  are  partly  of  one  tendency  and  partly  of  another.  They 
show  survivals  of  traits  which  are  logically  incompatible  with 
the  presence  of  other  traits,  yet  the  incongruities  exist.  His- 
torical veracity  consists  in  reporting  them  just  as  they  were, 
without  attempting  to  conventionalize  them  in  the  image  of 
any  conceptual  type  whatsoever. 

Turning  to  Vol.  I,  Policey,  we  find  at  once  in  the  Preface 
literary  symptoms  rather  favorably  contrasted  with  those 
observed  in  Justi.  Sonnenfels  begins  by  explaining  why 
he  finds  himself  obliged  to  add  a  textbook  to  those  already  in 


488  THE  CAMERALISTS 

existence.  Some  of  them  he  thinks  are  too  comi)rehensive, 
others  too  narrow  in  their  scope.  At  the  same  time  he  names 
none  of  these  works  at  this  point,  and  wc  are  obliged  to  search 
the  body  of  the  book  for  desirable  information  about  his  con- 
nection with  other  writers. 

The  Preface  to  the  fifth  edition  discusses  the  criticism  of  a 
reviewer  that  the  Importance  of  rewards  as  means  of  securing 
good  civil  service  har\  been  overlooked  in  the  earlier  editions. 
Sonncnfels  rei)lies  that  he  did  not  forget  the  subject,  but  that 
he  intentionally  omitted  rewards  from  his  schedule  of  means 
of  obtaining  good  government.  He  urges,  however,  that  the 
best  way  to  stimulate  a  high  quality  of  service  is  to  make 
distinction  the  prize  of  excellence.  Rewards  of  any  other 
sort  are  really  premiums  to  the  unworthy  who  do  not  become 
worthy  in  return  for  such  payments.  He  contends  that  civil 
servants  should  be  punished  for  neglect  of  duty,  but  should 
not  receive  premiums  as  means  of  making  them  perform  the 
duties  that  belong  to  their  positions,  and  he  supports  his  view 
by  citing  Hume  without  locating  the  quotation. 

This  first  volume  contains  552  pages,  of  about  125  words 
each,  and  is  divided  into  432  sections.  As  a  rule,  one  of  these 
sections  is  a  succinct  statement  of  the  substance  of  the  author's 
view  upon  the  matter  to  which  it  refers,  and  elaboration  rather 
than  addition  was  attempted  in  the  lectures.  The  point  of 
view  is  partially  indicated  in  the  opening  sections  of  the  "gen- 
eral introduction,"*  viz.: 

The  isolated  human  l>cing  is  not  the  human  being  in  the  slate 
of  nature;  his  condition  would  ))e  a  condition  of  constant  helplessness. 
But  he  feels  his  lack.     He  feels  that  he  is  capable  of  remedying  the 

'  This  "general  introd union"  orcupies  forty-nine  pages.  It  includes 
the  chapter  on  computing  the  population.  It  was  evidently  intended 
to  introtlucc  llic  three  volumes  as  a  whole.  It  is  followed  (p.  50)  by  an 
introduction  which  relates  specifically  to  Policey,  the  subject-matter 
of  the  Orst  volume. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  489 

lack,  of  improving  his  condition.  Reason,  which  distinguishes  him 
from  the  beasts,  enables  him  to  perceive  the  means  by  which  he  may 
reach  an  improved  condition.  This  means  is  socialization  with  his 
kind  [Vergesellschaftung  mil  seines  Gleichen].  The  natural  condi- 
tion of  man  is  thus  the  condition  of  society:  the  domestic,  the  con- 
jugal, the  paternal  society,  are  so  many  steps  whereby  he  comes 
nearer  to  the  great  society,  which  includes  all  others,  and  which, 
since  the  minor  groupings  direct  their  gaze  toward  the  weal  of  the 
separate  members,  has  adopted  as  its  aim  the  best  good  of  all  societies.  * 

I  In  a  note  Sonnenfels  comments:  "The  notion  of  the  isolated  human 
being  is  perhaps  merely  a  literary  abstraction.  Man  is  always  in  society, 
and  as  Ferguson,  in  his  Essays  on  the  History  of  CivU  Society,  acutely 
observes,  'a  savage  caught  somewhere  in  a  forest,  no  more  proves  that 
man  by  nature  lives  alone,  than  a  sheep  straying  in  a  forest  would  prove 
that  sheep  do  not  flock  together.'  " 

In  the  Preface  to  the  third  volume  (sth  ed.)  the  author  says:  "  I  have 
cited  only  those  books  that  I  have  read,  and  of  which  I  can  give  assur- 
ance that  it  will  pay  to  consult  or  read  them."  The  books  which  he 
explicitly  mentions  will  be  carefully  noted.  He  seldom  locates  the  pas- 
sages to  which  he  refers,  and  I  am  unable  to  decide  whether  the  remark 
quoted  applies  to  all  three  volumes,  or  whether  he  intended  it  to  include 
authors  cited  in  this  casual  way.  He  later  refers  to  Smith's  Wealth  of 
Nations.  Although  a  German  translation  of  the  Wealth  of  Nations  bears 
the  date  1776,  the  same  year  in  which  the  original  was  published,  I  am  not 
sure  that  the  version  appeared  as  early  as  the  date  would  seem  to  indicate; 
and  I  have  no  conclusive  reason  for  believing  that  at  the  time  of  making  his 
first  printed  allusion  to  Smith's  work  Sonnenfels  knew  it  except  by  title. 
If  he  had  actually  read  Smith  and  Ferguson  in  1787,  the  leaven  was 
working  in  Germany  rather  earlier  than  is  usually  supposed.  Even 
Ricardo  did  not  discover  the  Wealth  of  Nations  till  long  after  that  date. 

The  phrase  "so  many  steps,  etc.,"  might  be  turned  into  evidence 
that  Sonennfels  repudiated  the  "social  contract"  idea,  and  held  the 
evolutionary  view  of  the  origin  of  human  society.  A  monograph  recently 
conceived  iq  Berlin  and  published  in  Leipzig  employs  exegesis  of  this 
sort  to  read  into  Adam  Smith  and  Adam  Ferguson  a  considerable  cata- 
logue of  sociological  concepts  which  their  philosophy  had  never  dreamed 
of,  viz.:  Hermann  Huth,  Sociale  und  individualistische  Auffassung  im 
18.  Jahrhundert,  vornehnUich  bei  Adam  Smith  und  Adam  Ferguson. 
Bin  Beitrag  sur  Geschichte  der  Sociologie.    If  Sonnenfels  had  consistently 


490  THE  CAMERALISTS 

Sec.  3  continues: 

The  great  society  is  the  state.  The  transition  into  the  same 
has  given  the  members  a  new  name,  has  put  them  into  new  relation- 
ships. The  human  beings  have  become  citizens,  beings  who,  through 
the  nature  of  their  self-chosen  (sic/)  status,  have  now,  as  parts,  their 
relationship  to  a  whole,  are  united  as  members  in  a  moral  body. 
The  eflFect  of  this  unification  is  unity  of  ultimate  purpose,  unity  of 
will,  unity  of  force. 

The  three  following  sections  expand  the  three  principal 
concepts  in  the  last  sentence.    Thus  (§3): 

Unity  of  ultimate  purpose,  or  of  welfare,  of  the  best,  which  now  is 
called  the  best  good  of  the  community  das  genteinschaftliche  Beste] 
whereby  the  best  of  the  single  member,  that  is,  private  advantage, 
remains  constantly  subordinated  to  the  former,  and  cannot  be  other- 
wise brought  into  the  account  than  in  so  far  as  it  constitutes  a  part 
of  the  common  best  of  the  whole  body.  In  case  their  private  advantage 
could  not  be  reconciled  with  "the  common  best,"  the  former  must 
necessarily  be  subordinated  to  the  latter.  Fortunately,  however,  in 
the  precise  sense,  there  can  be  no  thought  of  a  contradiction  between 
the  true  permanent  private  welfare  and  the  general  welfare.  For 
upon  closer  examination  it  will  always  appear,  either  that  what  is 
regarded  as  private  advantage  ceases  to  be  such  so  soon  as  it  works 
in  opposition  to  the  general  advantage;  or  frequently  that  a  supposed 

limitation  of  the  common  weal  is  not  actually  such The 

welfare  of  the  parts  is  based  upx>n  the  welfare  of  the  whole;  but  at 
the  same  time  the  welfare  of  the  whole  springs  only  from  the  welfare 
of  the  parts.' 

applied  our  logic,  some  of  his  phrases  would  have  carried  him  nearer  to 
Darwin  than  to  Rousseau.     But — !! 

The  next  section  contains  typical  evidence  that  interpretation  of  an 
author  by  phrases  isolated  from  the  general  tenor  of  his  thought  is  impos- 
sible. 

'  Again,  if  we  might  credit  the  eighteenth  century  with  the  associa- 
tions of  the  twentieth,  we  should  say  that  here  was  a  profession  of  the 
most  modem  democratic  political  philosophy.  What  we  actually  find 
here  is  evidence  that  valuations  were  coming  into  vogue  which  were 
logically  incompatible  with  the  prevailing  quasi-absolutistic  political 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  49 1 

Sonnenfels  continues  (§4) : 

Unity  of  the  will,  which,  in  case  something  is  involved  whose 
effects  extend  to  community  interests,  suspends  all  contradiction, 
upon  the  principle  that  no  one  can  at  the  same  time  will  and  not  will, 
and  makes  the  separate  will  of  the  individual  subordinate  to  the 
community  decision.' 

In  §5  the  explanation  continues: 

Unity  of  force.  In  so  far  as  the  individual  energies  are  necessary 
for  the  attainment  of  the  ultimate  end  of  the  community,  they 
should  be  exerted  in  no  way  except  that  toward  which  the  community 
energy  is  devoted.  Whoever  withdraws  his  share  of  this  energy,  in 
case  the  common  ends  require  a  given  quantity  of  force,  leaves  the 

philosophy,  and  that  they  were  accelerating  the  motion  of  the  social 
process  toward  retirement  of  the  more  arbitrary  philosophy. 

The  perception  had  not  yet  been  reached  that  this  interdependence 
of  private  and  public  good  demanded  a  different  means  of  adjusting  in 
practice  the  claims  of  the  co-operating  factors.  That  is,  the  rulers  still 
decided  for  the  people  what  was  for  the  people's  good.  This  technique 
presuppxjsed  that  the  rulers  were  not  only  superior  in  wisdom,  but  that 
they  were  disinterested  judges.  Whether  the  former  assumption  was  valid 
or  not,  the  latter  was  directly  contrary  to  fact.  The  rulers  were  to  a 
considerable  extent  competitors  with  the  citizens  for  things  desired  by 
both.  That  the  former  should  be  perpetual  arbiters  about  relations  in 
which  they  were  perpetually  interested  parties,  was  the  essential  fallacy 
of  the  old  regime.  I  discover  no  evidence  whatever  that  Sonnenfels 
was  aware  of  this  weakness  in  quasi-absolutism.  Until  theorists  arfived 
at  this  perception,  they  were  intellectually  with  the  old  regime,  however 
symptomatic  their  emotions  may  have  been  of  a  changing  order. 

I  Again  the  approximateness  of  Sonnenfels'  philosophy  must  be 
pointed  out.  The  alleged  principle  was  thoroughly  modern  in  its  abstract 
statement.  It  proves  to  be  still  archaic  when  interpreted  by  the  implica- 
tions which  clung  to  it.  The  crucial  matter  was  to  get  a  technique  which 
could  properly  ascertain  the  social  will  in  contrast  with  the  individual 
will.  The  old  regime  simply  seized  the  power  to  make  the  will  of  certain 
individuals  subvert  the  will  of  the  overwhelmingly  larger  number  of 
individuals  and  count  as  the  will  of  the  society.  The  essence  of  quasi- 
absolutism  remained  in  force  in  political  theories  until  the  full  significance 
of  this  dilemma  was  admitted. 


492  THE  CAMERALISTS 

general  activity  too  weak;  but  if  he  turns  his  energy  against  the 
general  purpose  the  disadvantage  is  doubled,  because  the  energy 
of  another  person  is  thereby  nullified. 

In  the  sixth  section  Sonnenfels  distinctly  asserts  the  right 
of  each  member  of  society  to  take  part  in  deciding  what  meas- 
ures should  be  taken  to  attain  the  common  ends,  and  the  con- 
sent of  all  the  members  is  necessary  if  this  decision  is  to  appear 
in  a  law. 

In  the  seventh  section,  however,  doubt  is  cast  upon  the 
connotations  which  the  generalization  had  for  the  author's 
mind.  It  seems  to  be  more  a  historical  hypothesis  in  the 
sense  of  Hobbes,  Locke,  and  Rousseau,  than  a  moral  principle 
by  which  to  test  the  technique  of  existing  societies.  By 
means  of  this  generalization  Sonnenfels  accounts  for  the  transi- 
tion "from  the  multitude  to  society,  from  anarchy  to  the  sim- 
plest democracy."  He  goes  on  to  say,  however,  that  confusion 
must  soon  have  appeared  in  council,  universal  agreement 
must  have  been  impossible.  Decisions  of  some  sort  were 
necessary.  Out  of  this  practical  necessity  grew  the  different 
forms  of  government.  Then  follows  (§8)  enumeration  of 
democracy,  aristocracy,  and  monarchy,  with  the  comment 
(§9)  that: 

in  these  three  forms  of  jjovemn\ent  nothing  essential  to  society  is 
modified,  but  merely  the  form  in  which  the  common  will  expresses 
itsc'lf,  i.  e.,  either  through  the  majority  or  through  the  flite,  or  through 

the  autocrat Thus,  just  as  the  decisions  of  all  were  binding 

upon  each  individual,  the  same  must  be  the  case  with  the  decisions 
of  those  who  take  the  place  of  all.  This  obligation  on  the  one  side 
implies  on  the  other  side  the  right  of  compulsion,  and  irresistibility, 
and  thus  the  relations  between  rulers  and  ruled,  between  subjects 
and  the  supreme  power,  were  more  specifically  determined.  Originally 
(§io)  the  use  of  the  combined  forces  was  determined  by  the  will 
of  all  the  citizens.  Since  now  the  supreme  power  combines  in  itself 
the  community  will,  its  prerogative  is  likewise  to  determine  how  the 
community  energies  shall  best  be  used  for  the  common  welfare. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  493 

Gratitude  is  due  to  Sonnenfeis  for  reducing  this  reasoning 
to  such  a  bare  skeleton  that  its  most  serious  dislocation  is 
evident.  We  can  see  at  a  glance,  and  it  is  hard  to  understand 
why  thinkers  of  Sonnenfeis'  ability  did  not  perceive,  that  this 
was  merely  an  illusive  collocation  of  a  generalization  about 
political  rights,  a  hypothesis  about  historical  sequence,  and  an 
utterly  arbitrary  begging  of  the  essential  question  of  fact  about 
the  institution  of  monarchy.  This  special  pleading  was  a 
perfunctory  excuse  for  taking  quasi-absolutism  for  granted, 
and  proceeding  to  inquire  how  to  make  the  best  of  it.  If  each 
member  of  society  has  a  right  to  his  share  in  making  up  the 
will  of  the  society,  nothing  but  sheer  assertion  appears  in  Son- 
nenfeis* reasoning  to  justify  the  conclusion  that  the  monarch 
must  be  accepted  as  vicariously  exercising  that  right  for  all 
the  citizens,  and  must  be  obeyed  because  his  will  is  virtually 
the  will  of  all.  Thus,  in  spite  of  sentiments  which  make  for 
reconstruction  of  ideas,  Sonnenfeis'  major  premise  was  the 
same  old  impotent  makeshift  of  absolutism,  the  presumption 
that  royal  power  summarizes  all  the  fundamental  rights  of  citi- 
zens, and  that  it  is  a  political  datum  back  of  which  our  theories 
of  social  technique  must  not  pry. 

In  §11  Sonnenfeis  further  elaborates  his  concept  "welfare," 
and  it  is  in  this  direction  that  we  find  evidences  of  a  force  that 
was  generating  as  a  variant  both  of  the  theory  and  the  prac- 
tice of  quasi-absolutism.  While  criticism  of  the  social  logic 
summed  up  in  benevolent  despotism  was  not  admitted  into 
this  type  of  social  science,  the  concept  "welfare"  was  becoming 
more  intensive  and  was  thus  looming  up  as  a  factor  in  the 
modification  of  theory  and  indirectly  of  action.  The  syllabus 
continues: 

The  ultimate  purpose  for  the  sake  of  which  men  enter  society  is 
that  best  which  they  possess  neither  enough  moral  nor  physical  power 
to  attain  alone;  which  in  itself  considered  is,  to  be  sure,  the  separate 
best  of  each  member.    Since,  however,  this  separate  best  is  sought 


494  THE  CAMERALISTS 

by  each  al  the  same  time,  and  each  by  promoting  the  best  of  the 
other  thereby  also  confirms  his  own,  it  is  called  the  community 
best.  The  ultimate  purpose  of  men  entering  into  combination 
might  be  expressed  therefore  as  the  individual  best;  the  ultimate 
purpose  of  combined  men  as  the  general  best.  In  civic  societies  this 
best,  this  ultimate  purpose,  has  been  security  and  convenience  of 
life,  which  combined  constitute  the  public  welfare. 

Security  is  defined  (§12)  as: 
a  condition  in  which  we  have  nothing  to  fear.  The  condition  in 
which  the  state  has  nothing  to  fear  is  called  public  security,  that 
in  which  no  dtizen  has  anything  Jo  fear  is  called  private  security. 
When  the  state  is  safe  against  attacks  from  without,  the  condition 
is  called  public  external  security,  and  if  no  danger  threatens  from 
its  own  citizens,  there  exists  public  internal  security.  If  neither 
the  state,  from  within  nor  without,  nor  the  citizens  have  anything 
to  fear,  this  fortunate  condition  is  called  the  general  security. 

Tha  convenience  of  life  [continues  the  author  in  §13]  is  the  facility 
of  providing  one's  support  by  diligence.  Diligence  will  find  its 
support  the  easier  the  more  diversified  the  gainful  occupations.  The 
general  convenience  of  life  depends  therefore  upon  diversification 
of  the  gainful  occupations. 

The  general  welfare  [as  explained  in  §14]  cannot  be  maintained 

without  cost The  ruler  must  be  provided  with  revenues, 

which  must  be  in  proportion  to  his  dignity.  This  outlay  is  made 
for  the  best  good  of  all  the  citizens.  It  is  therefore  proper  that  the 
expense  should  be  borne  by  all  the  citizens,  but  that  it  should  be 
drawn  from  them  in  a  way  that  will  promote  the  ultimate  purpose. 

Thereupon  follows  the  definition  (§15) : 

From  manifold  observations  and  experiences  it  is  possible  to 
refer  the  various  rules  through  which  the  general  welfare  may  be 
maintained,  to  reliable  fundamental  principles,  and  to  give  them 
the  form  of  a  science,  which  is  Staatswissenschaft  in  the  most  com- 
prehensive sense;  that  is,  the  science  of  maintaining  the  welfare  of 

a  state,  the  science  of  governing We  are  convinced  that  the 

problematical  and  the  variable  does  not  reside  in  the  principles  of 
the  science,  but  in  the  circumstances  and  occurrences  to  which  the 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  495 

principles  are  to  be  applied.  The  mere  empiricist  in  politics  is 
therefore  as  lictle  to  be  regarded  as  a  statesman  as  the  empiricist  in 
the  healing  art  is  to  be  regarded  as  a  physician. 

When  Sonnenfels  takes  care  to  warn  against  confounding 
the  practical  administrator  with  the  empiricist  (§i6),  and 
when  he  describes  the  former  as  the  man  who  is  trained  and 
experienced  in  applying  the  rules  of  Staatswissenschaft  to  actual 
conditions,  he  completes  his  demonstration  that  he  is  dealing 
with  a  technology  pure  and  simple.  Sonnenfels  took  for 
granted  a  certain  general  standard  of  life.  He  did  not  go  to 
the  trouble  of  justifying  the  standard,  but  he  counted  on  it  as 
a  conceded  major  premise.  Then  his  problem  was  to  set 
forth  the  governmental  processes  by  which  that  standard 
might  be  reached.  Just  as  there  was  no  question  about  the 
authority  of  the  standard,  so  there  was  no  inquiry  into  the 
assumption  that  responsibility  for  maintaining  it  belonged 
to  the  government.  In  principle,  therefore,  as  we  have  said 
above,  Sonnenfels  was  simply  one  of  the  series  of  spokesmen 
for  the  dominant  regime  of  quasi-absolutism.  His  humani- 
tarian sympathies  called  for  qualification  of  the  system  in  detail, 
but  they  did  not  produce  the  slightest  variation  in  essentials 
from  the  typical  position  of  the  earlier  cameralists. 

Sonnenfels  replies  (§17)  to  the  possible  objection  that  poli- 
tics is  too  inclusive  to  be  the  subject-matter  of  a  science : 

The  ultimate  purpose  of  states  may  be  divided  into  four  cardinal 
subdivisions,  which  are  connected  with  one  another,  to  be  sure,  and 
must  join  hands  with  one  another,  each  of  which  stops,  however, 
with  a  subordinate  end.  Staatswissenschaft  has  accordingly  been 
divided  into  four  sciences,  yiz. :  external  security;  internal  security; 
diversification  of  gainful  occupations;  and  raising  the  revenues  neces- 
sary for  the  expenses  of  the  state. 

The  first  of  these  sciences  he  calls  (§18)  Staatswissenschaft  in 
the  special  sense;  otherwise  known  as  Staatsklugheit  or  Politik. 
The  second  is  his  Polizeywissenschaft  (§19).    The  third  he 


49^  THE  CAMERALISTS 

calls  Handlungswissensfhaft  (§20).  The  fourth  is  Finanz- 
wissenschaft  (§21).  The  extent  to  which  this  classification 
varies  from  Justi's  may  be  seen  by  comparison  with  pp.  303  flF. 
above.  ^ 

There  is  a  surprisingly  modem  appearance  on  the  surface 
of  §22,  the  last  of  the  Introduction.     It  reads: 

Natural  science  [Naturlehre]  in  all  its  parts,  jthe  mathematical 
sciences,  physical  geography  [Erdheschreibung],  the  history,  laws, 
languages,  are  to  be  regarded  partly  as  an  indispensable  preparation, 
partly  as  reinforcing  auxiliaries  of  the  theory  of  Polizey,  Hatidlung, 
and  Finanz.  But  the  man  of  affairs,  in  actual  administration,  must 
know  the  customs,  habits,  and  statutes  of  peoples,  the  reciprocal 
advantages  and  disadvantages  of  lands,  the  pwlitical  conditions  of 
states,  and  if  he  is  to  participate  with  advantage  in  law-giving,  he 
mast  know  men. 

We  should  compare  this  dictum,  however,  with  Justi's 
prospectus  of  a  scho<jl  for  cameralists,  and  we  should  not  jump 
to  the  conclusion  that  Sonnenfels  had  really  advanced  beyond 
him  in  discovery  of  the  proportions  and  relations  of  govern- 
mental technology. 

'  The  note  to  §17  is  an  important  literary  landmark,  viz.:  "It  may. 
be  for  this  reason  that  numerous  as  are  the  writers  upon  special  parts 
of  Staatswissenxchaft,  the  catalogue  of  those  who  have  undertaken  to 
cover  the  whole  is  extremely  small,  even  if  we  add  to  Justi's  Staatswirth- 
schaft,  and  Bielefeld's  Institutions  politiques,  St.  Real's  Staatskunst  and 
Stewart's  Staatswirtksckaft,  together  with  certain  so-called  outlines  and 
elements  of  the  Polizey-  und  Cameralwissenschaften,  and  if  we  honor 
the  Aristotelian  and  also  the  Hanoverian  edition  of  the  Wolffian  political 
lKX>ks  by  allowing  them  to  count  as  principles  of  Staatsivissenscha/t." 

The  "Stewart"  mentioned  in  the  note  was  evidently  Sir  James 
Steuart,  and  there  is  more  than  merely  verbal  significance  in  the  use  of 
the  term  Staatswirthscha/t  as  translation  of  his  title,  Inquiry  into 
the  Principles  of  Political  Economy.  Probably  no  German  was  fully 
aware  at  this  time  that  the  term  "Political  Economy"  stood  for  a  sort 
of  analysis  which  had  not  yet  been  proposed  in  Germany,  and  that  its 
lines  of  demarkation  ran  in  quite  distinct  directions  from  those  of  Stoats- 
wirthschaft. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  497 

The  second  chapter  of  Vol.  I,  Polizey,  is  entitled,  Funda- 
mental Principle  of  Civic  Science,  and  its  Branches.^  The 
chapter  begins  with  a  brief  homily  quite  in  the  spirit  of  its 
time,  upon  the  importance  of  a  principle  to  serve  as  an  a  priori, 
and  the  qualifications  which  such  a  fundamental  principle 
must  possess.  In  §24  Sonnenfels  adds:  "The  only  one  who 
has  referred  Staatswissenschaft  with  all  its  branches  to  a  uni- 
versal principle  is,  so  far  as  I  know,  Justi."  If  Roscher 
discovered  the  bearings  of  this  remark  and  of  the  context, 
he  certainly  failed  to  make  them  plain  to  his  readers.*  The 
passage  is  really  one  of  the  most  compact  illustrations  to  be 
found,  in  any  literature,  of  the  crossings  of  judgments  in  a 
period  of  scientific  reconstruction.  If  the  passage  had  been 
made  to  order  it  could  hardly  have  reflected  more  typicallv 
the  confusion  introduced  into  theory  by  attention  to  new  valua- 
tions: 

On  the  one  hand,  Sonnenfels  truly  interprets  Justi  as 
building  his  whole  theory  upon  the  principle  of  "general 
happiness"  [aUgemeine  Gliickseligkeit].^  On  the  other  hand, 
the  point  of  the  paragraph  is  its  attempt  to  show  that  it  is  a 
fallacy  on  Justi's  part  to  depend  on  such  a  principle.  In  spite 
of  more  evident  sympathetic  leanings  than  previous  cameralists 
had  shown  in  the  direction  toward  which  Justi's  principle 
points,  Sonnenfels  rejects  it  as  a  major  premise  for  civic  science. 

As  we  have  seen,  of  the  two  men,  Sonnenfels  was  far  and 
away  more  inclined  than  Justi  to  decide,  in  the  concrete,  in 
favor  of  the  alternative  which  promised  most  in  the  way  of 
general  happiness  in  the  modem  or  democratic,  as  distinguished 
from  the  absolutistic,  sense.    Yet  in  this  connection,  instead 

>  HauptgrundsatM  der  Staatswissenschaft  und  ihrer  Zweige. 

*  Op.  cit,,  p.  444.  Roscher  leaves  the  impression  that  Sonnenfels 
commended  Justi  in  this  passage.     The  precise  contrary  was  the  fact. 

3  The  sense  in  which  Justi  interpreted  the  concept  has  been  discussed 
above,  p.  323  et  passim.    Cf.  Index,  "Welfare." 


498  THE  CAMERALISTS 

of  praising  Justi,  Sonnenfels  really  blames  him.  His  contention 
is  that  "general  happiness"  cannot  be  made  a  test  of  civic  meas- 
ures, but  that  a  more  ultimate  test  must  be  found.  Thus 
Sonnenfels  deliberately  commits  himself  to  a  form  of  reasoning 
which  subordinates  in  theory  the  element  which  in  the  histori- 
cal perspective  makes  him  most  conspicuous:  and  he  reproves 
Justi  for  an  element  in  his  formal  reasoning  which  had  much 
less  effect  on  his  concrete  technology  than  it  had  on  that  of 
Sonnenfels  himself.  As  a  literary  landmark  the  passage  must 
be  cited  in  full.  We  must  remember  that  it  occurs  as  a  part  of 
the  argument  on  the  necessity  of  an  adequate  logical  principle 
as  the  basis  of  a  science.     It  reads: 

The  only  one  who  has  referred  Siaatswissensch^jt  with  all  its 
branches  to  a  universal  principle  is,  so  far  as  I  know,  Justi.  He 
assumed  as  such  a  principle  the  promotion  of  general  happiness. 
That  is  a  true,  but  not  a  conclusive  principle.  The  promotion  of 
general  happiness  is  the  object  of  all  states,  to  be  sure,  in  the  period 
of  their  origin,  and  it  is  their  perpetual  aim;  for  that  very  reason, 
however,  it  cannot  be  taken  as  a  principle  of  verification,  or  as  the 
general  fundamental,  because  by  means  of  this  fundamental  the 
goodness  of  the  measures,  which  consists  in  their  harmony  with  the 
ultimate  purpose,  must  be  tested. 

To  bring  out  Sonnenfels'  thought  as  distinctly  as  possible, 
we  must  translate  the  note  to  this  section,  viz.: 

In  his  [Justi's]  Staatswirthschaft  when  a  law  is  to  be  given,  or 
any  other  device  is  to  be  decided  on,  about  which  it  is  doubtful 
whether  it  would  be  advantageous  for  the  state,  the  question  is, 
"does  the  proposed  law  promote  the  general  happiness?"  Here- 
upon it  must  be  tested  by  that  principle,  as  the  moral  touchstone, 
and  when  the  judgment  of  benefit  or  injury  is  reached,  the  ground 
for  the  judgment  is  given  through  that  principle  (i.e.,  "general 
happiness").  In  case,  therefore,  the  promotion  of  general  happiness 
is  assumed  as  the  chief  fundamental  principle,  the  decision  will 
amount  to  this:  "It  promotes  the  general  happiness  l)ecause  it  pro- 
motes the  general  happiness." 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFFXS  499 

This  passage,  by  the  way,  may  serve  also  as  a  sample  of 
the  evidences  which  might  be  cited  in  support  of  the  estimate 
above  expressed  of  the  relative  intellectual  strength  of  Justi 
and  Sonnenfels.  The  former  had  few  qualms  about  adopting 
a  frankly  opportunistic  principle  and  getting  the  benefit  of 
all  the  conclusions  it  would  yield.  The  latter  tried  to  be  more 
profound,  but  succeeded  only  in  being  confused.  We  shall 
see  in  a  moment  that  Justi's  a  priori  was  no  more  and  no  less 
reducible  to  an  identical  proposition  than  Sonnenfels'  sub- 
stitute. The  chief  meaning  of  the  section  then  is  its  profession 
of  faith  in  a  deductive  a  priori  rather  than  a  functional  test  gf 
social  values.  The  next  section  shows  how  far  Sonnenfels 
was  capable  of  going  toward  a  test  which  was  absolute  in 
form  without  being  functional  in  essence.    Sec.  25  is  as  follows: 

Observation  of  how  civic  societies  have  arisen,  and  through 
what  means  they  have  reached  their  end,  will  more  surely  guide  to 
the  real  fundamental  principle.  The  isolated  man  was  at  the  mercy 
of  every  attack  by  a  superior  power.  His  security  was  not  greater 
than  the  forces  with  which  he  could  defend  himself  against  the 
attack.  Two  men  whose  physical  strength  exceeded  his  own  were 
already  dangerous  to  his  security.  He  therefore  sought  to  increase 
his  strength  by  combination  with  others.  The  isolated  man  felt  wants 
for  the  support  of  his  life,  sufficiency  to  satisfy  which  was  within  the 
compass  neither  of  his  strength  of  body  nor  of  soul  nor  yet  of  his 
time.  He  sought  to  satisfy  these  wants  by  putting  his  diligence  at 
the  service  of  the  wants  of  other  men,  from  whom  he  received  as 
compensation  the  supply  of  necessaries  which  he  lacked.  The 
i.solated  man'  was  deprived  of  a  thousand  comforts,  the  lack  of  which 
he  felt,  the  possession  of  which  would  make  his  external  condition 
more  complete.  He  sought  the  comforts  through  socialization 
[Vergesellschafiung]  with  others.  The  larger  the  society  into  which 
he  was  merged,  the  greater  was  the  quantity  of  the  resistance  which 
he  could  exert  in  every  case,  and  thereby  assure  his  security.  The 
more  numerous  the  society,  the  more  frequent  its  wants,  the  easier 
he  found  ways,  by  supplying  what  was  lacking  to  somebody,  to  get 


500  THE  CAMERALISTS 

trom  the  same  person  what  he  wanted.  The  more  numerous  the 
society,  the  more  various  were  its  products,  and  the  easier  was  it 
for  him  to  supply  each  of  his  wanLs  and  comforts.  Through. the 
enlarging  of  the  society  therefore,  and  according  to  its  bulk,  was  the 
aim  of  civic  societies  reached,  viz.,  the  security  and  comfort  of  life. 
In  later  times  this  aim  remains  ever  the  same.  The  same  means 
will  also  remain  effective. 

Continuing  the  argument  in  §36,  Sonnenfels  adds: 

The  enlargement  of  the  society  thus  contains  in  itself  all  subordi- 
nate special  means  which  in  the  aggregate  promote  the  general 
welfare.  So  soon  then  as  it  is  proved  of  an  institution  [Anstalt],  or 
of  a  law  that  it  makes  for  the  enlargement  of  the  society,  or  at  least 
does  not  hinder  the  same;  this  proof  at  the  same  time  carries  the 
higher  conclusion,  viz.,  that  the  measure  promotes,  or  at  least  does 
not  hinder,  the  general  welfare  either  on  the  side  of  security  or  of 
comfort.*  I  take,  therefore,  the  enlargement  of  civic  society,  through 
promotion  of  the  increase  of  population,  as  the  common  fundamental 
principle  of  Staatswissenschaft,  with  its  included  parts:  and  the 
validating  principle  [PriifscUz]  of  every  measure  which  is  adopted 
for  promotion  of  the  general  happiness  is  this:  Does  it  tend  to 
increase  or  diminish  population?* 

Further  comment  upon  this  explicit  statement  is  unneces- 
sary. It  confirms  our  proposition  about  the  uncertain  charac- 
ter of  Sonnenfels'  underlying  philosophy.  It  is  not  our  affair 
to  probe  the  logical  fatuities  of  the  cameralists  beyond  discovery 
of  their  actual  ways  of  thinking.  It  is  not  even  necessary  to 
note  that  by  turning  Sonnenfels'  method  against  himself  his 

I  I  will  not  enlarge  on  this  unconscious  confession  that  the  author 
at  last,  in  spite  of  himself,  relied  upon  "general  happiness,"  to  give  value 
to  "enlargement  of  society,"  rather  than  the  reverse.  I  simply  let  him 
speak  for  himself.     {Vide  pp.  493  and  531.) 

•  "  Of  that  school  of  populationists  which,  after  the  middle  of  the 
eighteenth  century,  may  count  as  a  revised  edition  of  the  mercantile 
system,  Sonnenfels  is  unquestionably  the  most  important  exponent  in 
Germany." — Roscher,  op.  cU.,  p.  536. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  501 

supposed  ultimatum  is  at  once  reduced  to  the  identical 
proposition  "Promoting  population  is  the  main  principle 
because  it  promotes  population."  We  go  far  enough  for  our 
purpose  when  we  find  that  Sonnenfels  was  content  with  the 
generalization  that  increase  of  population  promotes  the  general 
happiness,  and  thereupon  he  persuaded  himself  that  increase 
of  population  is  the  idtima  ratio  of  civic  science.  His  system 
turns  out  to  be  a  technology  in  the  interest  now  of "  the  general 
happiness,"  now  of  "the  promotion  of  population;"  with  more 
inclination  in  practice  than  previous  cameralists  had  shown 
to  treat  the  ill-defined  concept  "general  happiness"  as  the 
ultimate  end,  with  corresponding  tendency,  inadvertent  but 
real,  to  revise  valuations  of  all  means  whatsoever  by  judgment 
of  their  adaptation  to  that  end. 

In  the  same  connection,  however,  we  find  a  methodological 
indication  of  a  more  gratifying  kind.  It  adds  to  the  evidence 
scheduled  above  to  the  effect  that,  so  far  as  the  cameralists 
are  concerned,  it  is  very  easy  to  overestimate  the  distance 
betweien  previous  theories  of  population  and  that  of  Malthus. 
Thus,  in  §27,  Sonnenfels  speaks  as  follows: 

I  must  seek  to  avoid  indefiniteness.  The  population  contains 
all  the  means  which  the  common  welfare  [gemeinschajUiche  Wohl- 
fahrt]  demands.  All  institutions  of  the  ruler  should  accordingly 
be  directed  toward  maintaining  and  increasing  the  numbers  of  the 
population.  This  number,  nevertheless,  has  its  limits,  or  a  so-called 
maximum:  and  these  limits  are  drawn  by  the  nature  of  states,  by 
the  political  and  physical  situation,  and  by  the  circumstances. 
Genoa  will  never  reach  the  populousness  of  France.  The  bare 
rocks  of  Malta  will  never  maintain  as  many  inhabitants  as  fertile 
Sidly,  the  sandy  Mark  Brandenburg  never  so  many  as  Bohemia. 
This,  however,  should  not,  on  the  other  hand,  prevent  the  Senate 
of  Genoa,  the  Order  of  St.  John,  the  king  of  Prussia,  from  using 
all  means  to  assure  for  their  temtories  the  largest  population  which 
they  are  capable  of  supporting.  If  man  with  all  his  efforts  can 
never  be  quite  perfect,  yet  it  always  remains  nevertheless  a  principle 


S02  THE  CAMERALISTS 

of  morals  that  man  must  strive  for  the  highest  perfection !  In  poli- 
tics, as  in  morals,  if  small  states,  less  favored  than  others  by  nature, 
never  can  become  as  populous  as  those  which  combine  larger  area 
with  rich  soil,  this  does  not  invalidate  the  principle,  the  government 
should  always  concern  itself  with  promoting  population  to  its  highest 
level:  that  is,  the  highest  level  which  the  means  at  its  disposal  make 
possible.  This  explanation  will  remove  most  of  the  objections  which 
can  be  made  against  the  fundamental  principle  of  population.  I 
come  then  to  the  application  of  this  principle  to  the  separate  branches 
of  Staatswissenschaft. 

Thereupon.  Sonnenfels  indicates,  in  a  merely  formal  way, 
the  application  of  this  fundamental  principle  of  population  in 
the  diflferent  divisions  of  the  science.    Thus  (§§28-31): 

"The  greater  the  number  of  the  people,  the  greater  is  the  quantity 
of  the  resistance  upon  which  the  external  security  rests."  A  note 
adds:  "The  smaller  states  are  consequently  of  their  own  strength 
capable  of  no  high  degree  of  external  security.  They  combine 
with  others,  so  that  with  the  same,  in  respect  to  the  ultimate  purpose 
of  defense,  they  may  constitute  a  numerous  society.  Even  the 
promptness  of  diplomatic  action  is  affected  by  the  amount  of  power 
at  the  command  of  the  conferring  parties."  Then  follow  the  con- 
clusions: 

(i)  "Hence  the  fundamental  principle  of  Politik." 

(2)  "The  greater  the  number  of  the  people,  upon  whose  ready 
assistance  one  may  count,  the  less  has  one  to  fear  from  within — 
hence  the  fundamental  principle  of  PoHzey" 

(3)  "The  greater  the  number  of  people,  the  more  the  needs, 
hence  the  more  various  the  gainful  occupations  within  the  society. 
The  more  hands,  the  more  abundant  the  products  of  agriculture 
and  industry,  the  stuff  for  external  exchange.  Hence  the  funda- 
mental principle  of  Handlungswssenschaft." 

(4)  "The  greater  the  number  of  citizens,  the  more  are" there  to 
help  bear  the  public  expenses.  The  smaller  therefore  is  the  share 
of  each  taxpayer,  without  decreasing  the  total  amount  of  the  public 
revenues.  Consequentiy  the  fundamental  principle  of  Finanz- 
tvissenschafty 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  503 

"The  knowledge  of  population  is  therefore,  in  all  parts  of  public 
administration,  indispensable.  The  means  of  surveying  it,  as  a 
whole  and  in  its  parts,  belong  therefore  to  no  branch  of  Staats- 
ttdssenschaft  exclusively.  They  belong  as  introductory  knowledge 
to  all.'' 

If  we  were  relying  on  the  proof-text  method  of  supporting 
a  foregone  conclusion,  it  would  be  somewhat  difficult  to  explain 
away  the  formal  principle  either  of  Justi  or  of  Sonnenfels,  so 
as  to  justify  their  inclusion  in  the  cameralistic  series,  as  above 
defined  (p.  6  et  passim).  We  have  not  in  any  case  relied  on 
detached  propositions,  but  we  have  attempted  to  interpret  each 
writer's  single  propositions  by  the  whole  content  of  his  writings. 
We  have  made  his  promises  and  his  performance  confront  each 
other,  and  have  tried  to  find  the  resultant.  In  fact  both  these 
writers  were  centered  about  the  fiscal  needs  of  governments, 
and  their  principles  of  * '  welfare  "  and '  *  population  "  respectively 
were  in  effect  rather  less  distinctive  of  a  particular  type  of 
cameralism  than  regimental  colors  are  of  distinctive  military 
tactics. 

Chap,  iii  bears  the  title  "Means  of  Computing  the  Popula- 
tion.'^ It  does  not  profess  to  contain  a  contribution  by  the  author 
to  the  statistical  method,  and  is  significant  merely  an  as  index 
of  the  extent  to  which  statistical  theory  had  impressed  men  of 
Sonnenfels'  t)rpe.  Beginning  with  the  observation  that,  from 
the  earliest  times,  whether  the  doctrine  of  population  was 
taken  as  fundamental  principle  or  not,  states  have  been  inter- 
ested for  practical  purposes  in  ascertaining  the  size  of  the 
population,  the  author  distinguishes  two  methods  of  computa- 
tion, viz.,  "political  calculation,"  and  "actual  enumeration." 
Under  the  former  head  he  briefly  discusses  the  uses  and 
uncertainties  of  estimates  based  on  (a)  the  number  of 
deaths,  (b)  the  number  of  births,  (c)  the  consumption 
of  grain.  We  need  notice  merely  that  the  authors  to 
whom   Sonnenfels  refers  as  the  sources  of  his  information 


504  THE  CAMERALISTS 

about  statistics  are  the  following:  Bielefeld  (sic),  Institutions 
Politiques,  1760;^  Zanoni,  "VI.  Band  seiner  Briefe  dell*  agri- 
coltura  ddV  arte  e  del  comercio,  etc.;**'  Sussmilch,^  Kerseboom,* 
and  Melon. 5 

»  Vide  Roscher,  p.  426,  "Jacob  Friedrich  von  Bielfeld." 

*  These  two  writers  are  referred  to  as  having  furnished  a  brief  history 
of  political  computation,  tracing  it  back  to  the  middle  of  the  seventeenth 
century. 

3  GdtUiche  Ordnung  in  den  VerSnderungen  des  menschlichen 
Geschlechts  aus  dem  Geburt,  dem  Tode  und  Fortpfianzung  derselben 
erwiesen.  ist  ed.,  1743,  zd  ed.,  1761;    vide  Roscher,  op.  cit.,  p.  421. 

*  Abhandlung  zu  eincm  Versuche  der  wahrscheinlichen  Menge  des 
Volkes  von  Holland  und  Weslfriesland,  etc.;  vide  Roscher,  op.  cit.,  p.  421, 
"  Kersseboom." 

5  Essai  politique  sur  le  commerce,  1734;  German,  1756. 


CHAPTER  XIX 
THE  CAMERALISTICS   OF  SONNENFELS  ("POLIZEY") 

The  special  introduction  to  the  first  volume  bears  the  title: 
"The  Simplest  Concepts  of  Polizey  and  Consequently  an 
Outline  in  Accordance  with  Which  They  Will  Be  Treated." 

Assuming  that  political  institutions  wore,  to  a  much  greater 
degree  than  appears  probable  today,  premeditated  anticipa- 
tions of  evils,  Sonnenfels  makes  this  formula: 

When  these  measures  and  devices  are  assembled,  and  referred  to 
certain  principles  derived  from  the  nature  of  the  social  purpose,  there 
results  the  science  of  founding  and  maintaining  the  internal  security 
of  the  state;  that  is,  die  Polizeywissenschaft." 

The  author's  own  comment  will  best  indicate  the  relation 
of  this  formula  to  previous  conceptions  of  classification  within 
the  boundaries  of  Staatsudssenscfm/L    He  says: 

"  By  this  formula  I  take  issue  with  all  authors  who  have  previously 
treated  the  subject.  To  a  certain  extent  I  give  Polizey  an  entirely 
different  meaning.  Perhaps  I  should  say,  my  reason  is  because  the 
formulas  hitherto  offered  seem  to  me  too  vague,  too  ill-defined,  some 
of  them  too  limited,  not  including  all  which  belongs  within  the  scope 
of  Polizey:  others  too  general,  embracing  much  which  does  not  belong 
in  Polizey.  My  intention  is  not,  however,  to  repudiate  other  for- 
mulas, but  by  means  of  my  owh  to  draw  the  proper  boundaries  of 
Polizey  according  to  my  own  views,  and  to  exhaust  the  concept.  I 
think  I  have  a  right  to  demand  that  after  the  work  itself  has  been 
read  the  judgment  should  be  passed  whether  I  have  acted  in  accord- 
ance with  my  intention."  In  a  note  the  author  adds:  "This  inten- 
tion is  to  treat  the  internal  constitution  of  a  state  in  its  interdepend- 
ence, and  in  all  parts  of  the  public  administration,  and  at  the  same 
time  to  investigate  the  sources  of  law-giving.  Consequently  I  shall 
frequently  use  the  words  Polizey  and  Gesetzgebung  as  synonymous." 

<  He  refers  to  Montesquieu,  Esprit  des  loix,  Vol.  I,  chap,  zxiv,  p.  26. 

SOS 


506  THE  CAMERALISTS 

Sonnenfels'  further  analysis  of  his  method  of  treatment  will 
afford  the  most  direct  means  of  comparing  his  outlook  with 
that  of  Justi. 

The  author  proceeds  to  indicate  his  line  of  approach  by 
pointing  out,  first   (§44):^ 

that  in  a  certain  sense  Polizey  is  principally  defense  against  either 
intentional  or  fortuitous  occurrences  of  a  harmful  nature;  second, 
every  occurrence  which  hinders  the  accomplishment  of  the  ultimate 
purpose  of  society  must  be  regarded  as  harmful;  third,  from  this 
ix)int  of  view  Polizey  regards  every  transaction  which  does  not 
promote  this  ultimate  purpose  as  harmful. 

In  order  to  perform  a  harmful  act,  the  will  and  the  ability  must 
coincide.  The  law-abiding  man  has  constant  opportunities  to  per- 
form harmful  acts,  but  he  does  not  want  to.  The  imprisoned  crim- 
inal has  the  will  to  perform  harmful  acts,  but  he  is  deprived  of  ability. 
Hence  Polizey  falls  into  two  parts,  first,  directive,  the  intention  of 
which  is  that  no  one  shall  wish  to  perform  harmful  acts;  second, 
preventive,  which  seeks  to  make  it  impossible  for  anyone  to  commit 
harmful  acts  even  if  he  has  the  desire. 

The  will  of  the  actor  is  determined  by  impulses  [Beweggriinde], 
and  the  more  certainly  and  effectively  the  oftener  the  impulses  toward 
or  against  an  action  occur,  or  the  greater  the  weight  of  the  single 
impulse  which  operates  upon  the  actor.  This  is  the  invariable  prin- 
ciple of  will,  in  which  alone  the  great  secret  of  law-giving  resides. 
If  the  law-giver  only  knows  how  to  offer  his  people  preponderating 
impulses  toward  the  good,  he  may  be  assured  that  he  may  lead  them 
as  he  will.* 

The  impulses  to  action  are  of  two  sorts — first,  attractive  [ein- 
ladend\\  second,  preventive.  Again,  the  nature  of  the  advantages 
or  disadvantages  to  be  anticipated  from  actions  divides  impulses 
into  general  and  special.  The  general  impulses  include  all  actors 
and  actions.  For  that  reason  they  deserve  the  first  rank  in  law- 
giving. There  is  another  reason,  viz.,  there  are  actions  in  connection 
with  which  it  is  difficult  or  impossible  to  discover  a  special  attractive 

'  The  author's  own  fomis  of  statement  are  now  epitomized. 
>  Speaking  of  identical  propositions! 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  507 

or  preventive  impulse.  In  such  a  case  there  remains  for  the  law- 
giver only  the  motive  power  of  the  general  impulses,  which  may  be 
grouped  in  two  classes:  morals,  and  the  high  idea  of  the  excellence 
of  the  laws. 

Morals,  in  the  relation  in  which  they  are  regarded  by  the  law- 
giving authorities,  are  devotion  to  the  general  order.  As  Toussaint 
well  says,  "they  very  well  supply  the  place  of  laws,  but  nothing  is 
capable  of  supplying  the  place  of  morals."  Devotion  to  the  general 
order  is  the  effect  of  combined  institutions,  which  enlighten  the 
understanding  of  the  citizen  to  the  end  that  he  may  pass  correct 
judgments  upon  everything  which  affects  the  general  order,  which 
guides  the  inclinations,  which  controls  the  passions  and  directs  them 
to  worthy  actions.  The  whole  system  of  devices  to  this  end  I  refer 
to  under  the  phrase  attention  to  the  moral  condition. 

Next  in  importance  is  effort  to  propagate  a  high  idea  of  the  excel- 
lence of  the  laws;  that  is,  to  raise  it,  among  all  the  citizens,  to  the 
rank  of  an  accepted,  incontestable  principle,  that  whatever  the  laws 
command  is  good;  that  is,  with  respect  to  the  whole,  necessary; 
and  with  respect  to  each  individual,  profitable.  Whenever  the 
supreme  power  succeeds  in  establishing  this  presupf)osition,  it  is  the 
most  reliable  guarantee  for  the  observance  of  the  laws,  through  the 
violation  of  which  each  will  then  believe  that  he  will  harm  himself. 

But  given  the  willingness  to  obey  the  laws,  insight  into  the 
special  actions  that  would  conform  to  the  laws  is  not  thereby  assured. 
The  ruler  must  consequently  supply  this  lack  by  laws  which  specify 
what  is  to  be  done  and  left  undone.  This  is  what  Hume  had  in 
mind  when  he  said  that  the  laws  are  to  be  regarded  as  reinforcement 
of  the  insight  of  the  individual.  The  subject-matter  of  these  laws 
is  internal  public  and  internal  private  security. 

As  previously  defined,  internal  public  security  is  a  condition 
in  which  the  state,  that  is,  the  public  administration  (sicl),  whatever 
the  governmental  form,  has  nothing  to  fear  from  the  citizens.  Volun- 
tary obedience  to  the  law,  and  thus  public  security,  is  brought  about 
through  the  devotion  above  discussed.  Compulsory  obedience 
springs  from  the  consciousness  of  weakness  against  the  superior 
powers  of  the  sovereign,  or  from  impossibility  of  resistance.  What 
Montesquieu  in  another  connection  makes  the  fundamental  prin- 


So8  THE  CAMERALISTS 

ciple  of  a  civic  structure  [Staatsverfassung]  may  be  applied  here 
with  great  accuracy,  viz.,  "it  is  essential,"  he  says,  "that  through 
the  order  of  nature  one  force  holds  another  in  check;"'  that  is,  the 
quantity  of  possible  powers  of  resistance  on  the  side  of  the  citizens 
must  always  be  smaller  than  the  quantity  of  the  powers  of  coercion 
on  the  side  of  the  state.  Hence  the  chief  attention  of  the  Polizey 
and  law-givers  is  demanded  to  prevent  any  stratum  or  single  citizen 
from  attaining  to  such  power  that  the  public  authorities  may  be 
successfully  opposed. 

In  §52  Soiinenfels  repeats  the  definition  given  above  of 
internal  private  security,  and  he  proceeds: 

All  good,  which  can  accrue  to  the  citizen,  all  bad,  whereby  his 
happiness  may  be  endangered,  may  be  traced  back  to  his  business, 
his  person,  his  honor,  and  his  goods.' 

It  is  difficult  to  understand  why  the  elementary  observations 
which  followed  upon  the  workings  of  legal  mandates  and  sanc- 
tions were  necessary  or  even  tolerable  in  a  university  lecture- 
room.  As  we  have  said  above  in  the  case  of  Justi,  the  most 
plausible  explanation  is  that  they  were  of  a  piece  with  the 
homiletical  style  of  the  period,  the  method  of  magnifying  the 
obvious. 

The  foregoing  discussion  furnishes  the  reasons  for  the  siib- 

«  Esprit  des  loix,  Vol.  I,  Part  II,  chap.  iv. 

»  "Auf  seine  Handlungen,  Personen,  auf  seine  Ehre,  und  seine 
GUter."  The  ambiguity  of  the  term  Handlungen  might  be  used  as  one 
of  the  stigmata  of  the  untenable  analysis  in  which  it  figures.  The  same 
is  true  of  the  plural  Personen,  of  Ehre  as  having  a  possible  content  not 
gathered  from  the  other  three  categories,  and  of  Giiter,  in  distinction 
primarily  from  Handlungen,  and  secondarily  from  the  other  two  concepts. 
The  classification  serves  as  basis  of  the  technology  which  follows,  but 
the  confusion  which  corresponds  with  the  superficial  analysis  does  not 
much  affect  the  larger  relations  which  we  are  emphasizing,  and  we  may 
pass  it  with  this  notice.  Sonnenfels  adds  the  note  (p.  63):  "The  English 
writers  compress  all  into  the  words  Liberty  and  Property  [Freyheit  und 
Eigenthum].  Freyheit  has  special  connection  with  Handlungen,  Per- 
sonen, and  Ehre;   Eigenthum  with  Giiter." 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  509 

divisions  of  the  book.  Except  in  details  of  classification  and 
of  judgment  about  minor  means,  the  remainder  of  the  volume 
affords  little  material  for  our  purpose.  Roscher  has  digested 
the  technical  contents  of  the  three  volumes  in  which  Sonnenfels 
varies  somewhat  from  the  other  cameralists.*  The  most 
noticeable  contrast  with  Justi,  in  respect  to  technique,  is  the 
creation  of  the  division  Handlung  co-ordinate  with  Polizey, 
instead  of  treating  subjects  falling  under  the  former  as  subdi- 
visions of  the  latter.  In  respect  to  the  spirit  of  the  treatment 
I  am  able  to  adopt  Roscher's  judgments  with  but  slight  modi- 
fication.' 

"For  the  development  of  German  national  economy, 
Sonnenfels  may  be  characterized  most  accurately  in  this  way: 
his  standpoint  reminds  us  essentially  of  Justi's  ideas,"  but 
he  gave  to  the  ideas  an  apparently  firmer  setting  in  the  sort 
of  reasoning  which  was  conventional  in  his  day;  and  he  was 
rather  more  systematic  in  developing  the  consequences  of  the 
ideas.  "At  the  same  time  the  demands  of  the  ought-to-be 
play  with  him  a  much  more  significant  role  than  explanation 
of  the  existing.  Suggestion  of  practical  propositions  is  in  bulk, 
as  well  as  in  the  interest  of  the  author,  much  more  notable 
than  the  scientific  analysis  of  the  subjects  in  question." 

Although  we  shall  be  led  into  somewhat  extended  discus- 
sion of  numerous  details,  we  have  thus  covered  in  principle 
all  that  our  main  purpose  calls  for  in  the  case  of  Sonnenfels, 
and  what  follows  amounts  merely  to  illustrative  specifications 
under  previous  propositions. 

The  first  section  in  the  chapter  on  "Attention  to  the  Moral 
Condition"  is  worth  quoting  as  a  summary  of  Sonnenfels' 
ethical  preconceptions.     He  says  (§61): 

Morals  are  a  common  subject-matter  of  religion,  of  ethics,  and 
of  law-giving;  but  each  treats  them  in  the  light  of  its  own  purpose; 
«  Op.  cU.,  pp.  536  ff. 
*  The  original  should  be  compared,  op.  cit.,  p.  536. 


5IO  THE  CAMERALISTS 

the  first  two  as  an  end,  the  last  only  as  a  means,  satisfied  if  corre- 
spondence of  conduct  with  the  laws  can  be  procured  not  by  the  most 
lofty  motives,  but  also  merely  by  hope  of  an  advantage  or  by  fear 
of  punishment.  Hence  arises  the  idea  of  political  virtue,  which 
diflfers  from  the  concept  of  virtue  demanded  by  ethics  and  religion. 
Political  or  social  virtue  is  the  facility  of  ordering  one^s  conduct  in 
correspondence  with  the  laws  oj  the  society.  The  motor  machinery, 
whereby  this  correspondence  is  procured,  does  not  fall  within  the 
scope  of  the  present  explanation,  since  virtue  of  a  higher  order  is  not 
to  be  dispensed  with.  Meanwhile  there  is  no  ground  for  the  anxiety 
that  political  virtue  may  be  dangerous  for  religion  and  ethics  [Sitten- 
lehre];  that  would  be  the  case  if  political  virtue  and  religious  virtue 
were  in  antithesis  with  each  other :  but  this  is  by  no  means  the  case. 
For  the  purpose  of  the  law-giver,  to  be  sure,  the  first  is  enough; 
yet  the  second  is  not  thereby  excluded,*  but  to  a  certain  extent  it  is 
presupposed  by  the  first.  A  wise  law-giver  will  always  seek  to  base 
social  virtue  [Gesellschaftungstugend]  upon  moral  virtue,  yet  from 
inadequacy  of  the  means  at  his  command  he  cannot  always  discover 
whether  each  member  of  society  in  practice  bases  his  social  virtue 
upon  moral  virtue.  He  must  therefore  be  content  to  take  knowl- 
edge simply  of  the  body  of  the  transactions,  and  he  leaves  it  to  the 
spiritual  teacher  to  introduce  the  vitalizing  spirit  of  religion. 

Of  course  Sonnenfels  is  at  this  point  merely  a  symptom  of 
the  ethical  and  theological  dichotomy  which  still  succeeds  in 
keeping  most  of  the  population  of  the  world  under  the  impres- 
sion that  virtue  is  an  affair  of  separate  circuits,  which  may  be 
operated  independently  or  be  brought  into  communication 
with  one  another.  It  was  no  peculiar  demerit  of  his  that  he 
could  treat  social  virtue  as  different  in  kind  from  ethical  or 
religious  virtue.  It  would  simply  plunge  us  into  conflict  with 
speculative  moral  philosophy  in  general  if  we  should  enter 
upon  discussion  of  this  part  of  the  analysis.  We  may  simply 
allow  him  to  show  further,  in  his  own  idiom,  what  working 
relation  he  presupposed  between  social  virtue  on  the  one  hand 
and  religious  virtue  on  the  other.     In  §63  he  says: 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  511 

The  chief  and  most  effective  means  for  the  building-up  of  morals 
are  religion,  education,  and  the  sciences.  Among  these  religion 
deserves  the  first  place.  Religion  is  the  gentlest  bond  of  society. 
Religion  instructs  through  her  venerable  teachings  in  goodness. 
Religion  stimulates  to  the  application  of  the  same  through  promises. 
Religion  deters  from  evil  actions  by  threats.  Religion  brings  about 
thorough  repentance,  which  she  produces  in  the  sinner,  and  forgive- 
ness, which  she  offers  to  the  penitent,  the  improvement  of  the  vicious. 
Religion  increases  therefore  the  determining  as  well  as  the  deterring 
motives.  Law-giving  would  in  countless  cases  find  itself  inadequate, 
if  religion  did  not  beneficently  come  to  its  aid.  Whenever  the  eye 
of  the  law-giver,  and  consequently  also  the  penalty  of  the  judge, 
fails  to  accomplish  the  end,  the  exalted  principle  of  the  omnipresent 
God,  as  witness  and  judge  of  all,  even  the  most  secret  evildoers,  is 
the  sole  means  of  arresting  evil  undertakings.  The  whole  world 
is  consequently  in  agreement  with  Warburton,  that  the  doctrine  of 
a  future  life  of  rewards  and  punishments  is  utterly  indispensable  for 
every  civic  society.  The  ruler  may  not  disregard  this  leash  [Leitrie- 
men]  given  into  his  hand,  and  he  must  take  care  that  every  citizen 
in  the  state  has  religion.  From  this  point  of  view  (§64)  freethinking 
appears  as  a  political  crime,  because  to  a  certain  extent  it  robs  the 
state  of  the  means  of  guiding  its  citizens  most  completely.  The 
chancellor  Bacon,-end  President  Montesquieu  have  never  been  under 
suspicion  as  persecutors,  yet  the  former  writes:  "No  one  denies  God, 
except  those  who  have  an  interest  in  there  being  no  God;"'  the 
latter:  "From  the  opinion  that  there  is  no  God  comes  our  independ- 
ence or  our  revolt."*  Accordingly  to  them  the  atheist  becomes 
either  a  criminal  or  a  disorderly  citizen.  Consequently  the  concord 
and  happiness  of  the  state  depend  on  intolerance  of  the  declared 
freethinkers;  and  circumstances  might  often  make  it  necessary  for 
the  public  authorities  to  demand  of  everyone  a  visible  sign  of  the 
religion  "to  which  he  adheres. "' 

I  Sonnenfels  simply  refers  to  "  sermones  fideles,  etc." 
»  Esprit  des  loix,  Vol.  XXXIV,  chap.  ii. 

3  A  note  to  this  section  reads:  "  During  the  reign  of  Queen  Elizabeth, 
a  penalty  of  twenty  pounds  was  imposed  upon  anyone  who  absented 


512  THE  CAMERALISTS 

The  argument  continues  (§65): 

From  the  necessity  of  religion,  even  for  the  temporal  happiness 
of  the  citizens,  and  the  common  security,  are  derived  the  right  and 
the  obligation  of  the  Polizey  to  extend  its  attention  to  the  education 
of  the  people  in  religious  duties,  to  prevent  abuses,  and  to  watch 
over  the  external  order  of  religious  functions  and  worship.  The 
instruction  in  the  duties  of  religion,  in  the  rural  regions  particularly, 
is  worthy  of  so  much  attention,  because  with  the  rural  population 
religion  must  largely  take  the  place  of  education,  and  at  the  same 
time  it  is  the  only  means  of  making  an  impression  upon  their  ways 
of  thinking.  The  first  object  to  which  the  care  of  the  Polizey  should 
be  given  in  this  respect  should  be  sufficient  and  skilful  curates.' 

On  the  ground  of  necessity  for  public  morals,  education 
is  then  discussed  as  a  section  of  the  duties  of  Polizey.  The 
author  says   (§70): 

After  religion,  education  has  the  greatest  influence  upon  morals. 
It  is,  to  be  sure,  a  peculiar  duty  of  parents;  but  not  only  a  son,  a 
citizen  is  also  to  be  educated.  Education  can  therefore,  on  account 
of  its  connection  with  the  common  welfare,  not  be  a  matter  of  indif- 
ference to  the  law-giver,  and  cannot  be  left  by  the  state  to  private 
whim.  Parents  must  be  compelled  to  give  their  children  the  neces- 
sary education  (§71).  In  order  that  dependent  children  may  be  edu- 
cated, academies,  foundling  and  orphan  asylums  are  necessary  (§72). 
It  is  desirable  that  public  schools  should  be  attended  by  children 
of  the  upper  as  well  as  of  the  lower  classes,  for  the  sake  of  making 
these  classes  acquainted  with  each  other  (§73).  Sees.  74-79  go 
into  some  detail  about  alternatives  in  the  administration  of  found- 
ling and  orphan  asylums,  with  respect  to  influence  upon  public 

himself  for  a  month  from  public  worship."  The  authority  for  the  state- 
ment is  given  as,  "Hume,  Hist,  de  la  maison  de  Tudor,  Tome  V."  Evi- 
dence of  this  and  like  kinds,  in  spite  of  occasional  appearances  to  the 
contrary,  makes  it  probable  that,  whenever  English  sources  were  cited, 
they  were  usually  known  to  Sonnenfels  by  name  only,  or  through  transla- 
tions, usually  French. 

■  The  four  following  sections  elaborate  the  last  proposition,  and 
specify  problems  and  duties  for  ReligioHspoHuy. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  513 

morals,  and  §§80-82  attempt  to  answer  the  question  whether  it  is 
worth  while  tO'enlighten  the  people  through  "the  sciences."  Son- 
nenfels  urges  instruction  in  the  lower  schools  about  ordinary  civic 
duties,  and  he  argues  for  favors,  like  separate  jurisdiction,  for  the 
higher  schools,  in  order  that  their  prestige  may  be  increased.  Then 
follow  hints,  rather  than  programmes,  about  the  availability  of 
various  minor  means  for  promoting  good  morals  (§§83-98);  dis- 
tinctions for  exemplary  citizens,  the  stage,  with  necessity  of  censor- 
ship, and  as  another  negative  means,  the  censorship  of  books.  In 
connection  with  this  last  subject  Hume  is  quoted,'  to  the  effect  that 
the  freedom  of  the  press  is  absolutely  assential  to  England's  form 
of  government,  in  order  that  mind  and  talent  may  without  any  hin- 
drance act  in  defense  of  liberty.  "But,"  answers  Sonnenfels,  "this 
author  himself  admits  that  this  same  means  allows  the  spirit  of  resist- 
ance, of  revolt,  and  other  harmful  influences  to  be  spread  abroad. 
He  consequently  holds  the  censorship  as  necessary  for  other  forms 
of  government,  especially  for  the  ecclesiastical  state.  Perhaps 
we  are  justified  in  replying  to  the  Englishman,  that  the  goodness 
of  a  constitution  which  is  capable  of  preservation  only  by  such 
dangerous  means,  must  be  very  equivocal." 

But  Sonnenfels  presently  reaches  conclusions  which  have 
a  firmer  psychological  basis,  whatever  be  the  estimate  of  them 
in  current  economic  or  political  theory.  In  §100  he  begins 
with  the  premise  that  law-giving  wisdom  must  provide  the 
general  and  special  means  of  preventing  vagrancy  and  idleness 
in  general.  The  previous  §99  lays  down,  as  a  major  premise 
for  this  dictum,  the  proposition  that  idleness  produces  immoral- 
ity. Whether  we  should  agree  or  not  with  the  inference  that 
the  government  must  prevent  idleness,  there  is  little  doubt 
among  social  theorists  today  that  an  occcupation  is  one  of  the 
primary  conditions  conducive  to  morality  in  Sonnenfels'  sense 
of  the  term.  The  special  arrangements  which  he  recommends 
for  repressing  idleness  fall  under  the  heads:  prevention  of 
begging;   careful  inspection  to  see  that  everyone  in  the  state 

» Political  EssaySfVol  II,  Part  I,  "Essay  on  the  Liberty  of  the  Press." 


514  THE  CAMERALISTS 

is  earning  a  liNing;  checking  of  all  useless  occupations  akin 
to  vagrancy;  diminution  of  the  number  of  students  (because 
in  Austria  they  were  said  to  be  in  excess  of  the  positions  requir- 
ing highly  educated  men) ;  good  discipline  of  the  servant  class 
(§§107-14),  and  as  a  means  of  making  all  these  efforts  efficient 
well-ordered  workhouses  and  penal  institutions  (§§119-21). 
Everything,  of  the  nature  of  free  soup,  and  indiscriminate 
alms-giving,  including  gifts  to  begging  students,  is  protested 
against  almost  in  the  spirit  of  modern  scientific  charity  (§§ioi- 
6).  The  degree  to  which  Sonnenfels  relies  on  constraint,  as 
compared  with  his  belief  in  attractive  measures,  is  noticeable 
at  every  step.  The  second  phase  of  laws  relating  to  the  servant 
class,  viz.,  their  protection  against  unjust  employers,  is  treated 
in  §§115,  116;  and  the  third  phase,  provision  for  reducing 
the  number  of  the  unemployed  servant  class,  in  §§117,  118. 
While  he  emphasizes  the  danger  to  good  morals  from  all  toler- 
ance of  pandering  to  sexual  vice,  Sonnenfels  has  only  the 
following  as  a  programme  (§122): 

All  that  can  be  demanded  of  a  reasonable  Polizey  is,  not  that  its 
attention  shall  be  carried  to  the  extreme  of  increasing  its  numbers 
for  the  purpose  of  spying  and  house-visitation,  nor  that  by  excessive 
severity  toward  weaknesses  it  shall  give  occasion  for  greater  and 
more  dangerous  crimes,  but  that  the  Polizey  shall  restrict  itself  to 
preventing  public  indecency,  and  outbreaking  offenses,  and  that  it 
shall  co-oj)erate  with  parents,  relatives,  married  people,  who  make 
complaints  about  seduction  of  their  relatives,  or  disturbance  of 
domestic  order.  Beyond  that,  religion,  education,  and  reduction 
of  the  number  of  the  unmarried  must  do  the  most  toward  the  restric- 
tion of  an  evil  which  it  will  be  possible  for  no  foresight  entirely  to 
uproot. 

Finally  the  chapter  concludes  with  this  omnibus  paragraph 

(§123): 

The  Polizey  must,  however,  exert  itself  to  remove  all  occasions 
through  which,  directly  or  indirectly,  moral  disorders  of  another  sort 
may  be  increased.     Here  belong,  for  lessening  drunkenness,  and  the 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  5^5 

evils  that  flow  from  it,  the  restriction  of  the  number  of  dram  shops; 
the  ordinance  that  after  a  certain  hour  (at  night)  nothing  more  shall 
be  sold  in  such  shops,  and  at  no  time  to  intoxicated  persons;  exem- 
plary punishments  for  confirmed  drunkards;  prohibition  of  lodging 
strangers  except  in  recognized  inns;  and  further,  measures  approved 
by  monarchs  of  insight,  and  readily  granted  by  a  head  of  the  church 
worthy  of  immortality,  viz.,  for  decrease  of  the  number  of  feast 
days.  For  it  is  certain  that  all  time  devoted  to  labor  will  be  rescued 
from  vice  and  excess. 

The  spirit  of  chap,  ii,  "On  the  Means  of  Awakening  a 
High  Idea  of  the  Laws,"  may  be  indicated  very  briefly.  The 
fundamental  proposition  is  that: 

"  on  the  average  in  a  nation  high  respect  for  the  law  will  be  less  a 
result  of  persuasion  than  of  antecedently  formed  opinion,  that  is,  of 
a  favorable  prejudice"  (§124).  This  prejudice  must  be  aroused 
and  strengthened.  It  may  be  weakened  or  destroyed.  The  means 
in  either  case  are  in  the  hands  of  those  who  give  the  laws.  In  repub- 
lics, where  laws  are  examined  by  representations  of  the  people  before 
they  are  enacted,  the  presumption  of  the  goodness  of  the  laws  springs 
from  the  nature  of  the  constitution.  That  is,  it  is  supposed  that  the 
law  would  have  been  rejected  if  its  advantages  had  not  been  beyond 
all  doubt.  In  monarchies,  that  which  occurs  in  republics  before 
the  acceptance  of  a  law  should  occur  at  the  promulgation  of  the  same. 
This  may  take  place  in  two  ways — first,  by  giving  assurance  that 
consultation  with  estates,  parliaments,  councilors,  etc.,  preceded  the 
decree;  second,  that  every  law  should  have  a  preamble,  setting  forth 
the  reasons  why  it  was  necessary  for  the  public  weal  and  bene- 
ficial for  the  individual.  "A  government  which  imposes  upon  itself 
the  rule  of  accompanying  its  laws,  so  far  as  possible,  with  reasons, 
shows  confidence  in  its  measures,  honors  the  intelligence  and  integ- 
rity of  the  citizens,  appears  less  to  command  than  to  persuade.  The 
people  itself  imagines  that  it  obeys  less  the  law  than  its  own  insight." 
Again  (§128)  it  is  added:  "Even  if  the  law  bears  only  some  such 
legend  as  'moved  by  the  public  good,'  the  people  will  be  inclined  to 
believe  it."  Furthermore,  the  conviction  which  assumes  that  the 
laws  are  good  is  produced  by  laws  of  great  age,  and  the  invariability 


5i6  THE  CAMERALISTS 

of  lan-s  is  the  condition  of  their  attaining  great  age  (§129).  Con- 
flicting interpretations  of  the  law  by  experts  weaken  the  presump- 
tion in  its  favor  C§i3i).  Nothing  weakens  the  prestige  of  the  laws 
more  than  a  distinction  between  obligation  before  the  judge,  and 
absence  of  obligation  in  conscience  (§132). 

Chaj).  iii,  "On  Provision  for  Holding  Private  Powers  in  a 
Subordinate  Equilibrium  with  the  Powers  of  the  State,"  may 
also  be  epitomized  very  briefly.  The  main  proposition  is 
that: 

the  [K)wers  of  resistance  on  the  side  of  the  citi/ens  must  always  l>e 
kept  inferior  to  the  powers  of  compulsion  on  the  sifle  of  the  state 
(sic)  (§136).  This  persistent  antithesis  between  the  citizens  and 
the  state  is  one  of  the  most  essential  traits  of  the  pre-democratic 
political  philosophy.  "The  forces  or  means,  which  might  hinder 
the  state  in  the  exercise  of  its  powers,  consist  of  wealth,  of  the  strength 
oj  a  stratum  of  society,  and  of  privileges."  "While  security  of  prop- 
erty is  one  of  the  principal  advantages  to  be  gained  by  civic  society, 
wisdom  seeks  to  prevent  the  accumulation  of  excessive  private  wealth" 
(§138).'  It  is  not  wise  to  prescribe  the  limits  of  wealth  which  indi- 
viduals or  families  may  possess  (§139);  but  the  state  may  set  precise 
lx)unds  to  the  wealth  of  deathless  societies.  "This  necessity  has 
iK-en  recognized  in  all  states,'  especially  since  Kdward  I  set  the 
example  with  his  'amortization  laws'  "  (§140).  "In  ca.se  the  laws 
have  neglected  to  provide  against  too  great  accumulation  of  wealth 
in  families,  indirect  measures  may  l>e  adopted  with  advantage  to 
correct  the  evil;  as  when  Henry  VII  of  England  allowed  the  division 
of  the  estates  of  the  nobility  among  several  sons.  If  he  had  ordered 
the  division,  it  would  have  lx;en  resisted.  The  f)ermission  was 
regarded  as  lx;neficent.  Similar  indirect  measures  may  \)c  taken 
to  limit  the  growth  of  deathless  societies  (§141);  and  parallel  action 
is  wise  in  the  case  of  societies,  parties,  and  organizations  of  many 
sorts  which  tend  to  acquire  excessive  power  (§142  fT.).  Sees.  149  ff. 
deal  with  cases  in  which  sedition  of  more  or  less  violent  sort  breaks 

'  Hume  is  again  cited  rather  vaguely,  p.  181. 

»  Illustration  cited  from  Hume,  " Lehen  Edwards  /,"  Ceschichte 
von  England,  T.  2. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  517 

out,  from  actual  violation  of  laws  against  accumulation  of  riches  or 
power,  to  reflections  on  the  government  by  public  speakers,  preach- 
ers, teachers,  actors,  writers,  etc.;  and  different  kinds  and  degrees 
of  censorship  by  the  police  are  rather  vaguely  recommended.  The 
duties  of  the  police  in  case  of  disorderly  assemblies  are  rather  hinted 
at  than  specified  (§§155  ff.). 

Chap,  iv,  "  On  Security  of  Action, "  is  notable,  first,  because 
it  gives  evidence  that  some  of  the  concepts  of  an  innovating 
popular  philosophy  were  beginning  to  call  for  attention  in  one 
of  the  more  conservative  universities  of  the  German  countries. 
Sonnenfels  begins  by  saying  that  "security  of  action"  and 
"freedom  of  action"  are. identical  ideas.  "They  refer  to  the 
condition  in  which  we  have  nothing  to  fear  with  respect  to  our 
actions."  Thereupon  he  undertakes  an  analysis  of  the  dis- 
tinctions to  be  made  between  "freedom,"  "licentiousness" 
[ZiigellosigkeU],  and  "independence"  [Unabhdngigkeit],  The 
presuppositions  of  his  argument  are,  first,  "the  laws  of  nature;" 
second,  "the  social  compact."  These  make  "freedom"  a 
limited,  not  an  absolute  condition,  and  per  contra  they  estop 
licentiousness  and  independence.  Regardless  of  the  method 
of  the  argument,  the  author  urges  the  sane  view,  which  he 
phrases  after  Pope,  that  "he  who  obeys  reason  is  free."  He 
finds  that  reasonable  freedom  or  security  of  action  may  be 
endangered,  first,  by  the  ruler,  considered  as  law-giver  and 
judge;  e.g.,  when  he  transgresses  the  limits  of  the  law-giving 
power,  or  when  he  falsely  accuses,  or  unfairly  conducts  a  pro- 
cess in  court;  second,  by  fellow-citizens  in  various  relations. 
The  succeeding  discussion  of  the  limits  of  the  law-giving  and 
judicial  power  is  literary  rather  than  technical,  but  it  marks 
a  rising  tide  of  demand  for  laws  and  administration  of  them, 
in  conformity  with  needs  which  citizens  feel  to  be  reasonable. 
In  this  connection  (§§165-69),  Sonnenfels  presents  his  famous 
objections  to  torture  as  a  judicial  measure.  The  infringements 
upon  security  of  action  by  fellow-citizens  are  scheduled  under 


5i8  THE  CAMERALISTS 

the  heads,  "servitude,"  "chattel  slavery,"  "constraint  by 
parents,  guardians,  etc."  (§§171-75). 

Chap.  V,  "On  the  Security  of  the  Person"  (§§176-293), 
covers  a  wider  range  of  detail  with  a  greater  number  of 
specific  topics,  than  any  other  main  division  of  the  book. 
Although  in  many  cases  it  indicates  rather  definite  policies 
about  particular  problems,  yet  on  the  whole  it  has  rather  the 
force  of  a  catalogue  of  subjects  than  of  a  codification  of  rules. 
Its  importance  is  technological,  and  a  proper  estimate  of 
its  value  could  be  made  only  by  technologists  in  the  different 
subjects  of  which  it  treats.  It  does  not  furnish  material  which 
falls  directly  within  the  scope  of  our  inquiry.  It  should  be 
said,  however,  that  it  is  another  remarkable  reflection  of  the 
degree  of  attention  which  German  administrative  theory  had 
already  given  to  details  affecting  public  welfare.  It  discusses 
a  surprising  number  of  relations  by  which  physical  well-being 
is  affected.  These  range  from  crimes  of  violence,  to  methods 
of  relieving  poverty,  caring  for  the  sick,  promoting  public 
hygiene,  and  securing  pure  food  or  pure  air.  It  should  be 
noticed  too  that  the  chapter  includes  a  strong  and  explicit 
argument  against  toleration  of  duelling,  and  also  against  all 
methods  of  procuring  abortions.  In  the  latter  connection 
Sonnenfels  shows  farsighted  views  about  the  policy  which 
the  government  should  pursue  toward  mothers  of  illegitimate 
children. 

Chap,  vi,  "Security  of  Honor"  (§§294-304),  proposes  to 
treat  of  honor  "considered  as  respect  for  the  integrity  [Rec/il- 
schaffenheit]  of  a  citizen."  The  viewpoint  is  indicated  by 
the  propositions:  "Whatever  deprives  the  citizen  of  honor, 
therefore,  robs  him  of  actual  advantages,  harms  him  seriously: 
and  the  legal  authority  is  bound  to  defend  every  citizen  against 
such  injuries."  The  chapter  accordingly  specifies  the  following 
subjects  which  should  be  taken  into  account  in  applying  the 
principle:  supposed  hereditary  dishonor  (§§295-97);  supposed 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  519 

dishonor  on  account  of  certain  occupations,  court  servants, 
spies,  executioners,  etc.  (§298);  loss  of  honor  through  insult 
and  slander  (§§300-303) ;  loss  of  honor  through  seduction  (§304). 
It  should  be  observed  that,  whatever  be  the  value  of  the  means 
recommended  in  these  connections,  the  content  of  private  and 
public  welfare  in  particulars  of  which  this  chapter  contains 
samples  was  much  more  justly  estimated  in  the  German  civic 
theories  of  the  cameralistic  period  than  in  the  practice  of  mod- 
ern democracies.  We  have  by  no  means  improved  in  all 
particulars  upon  the  civic  theories  of  the  eighteenth  century. 

Chap,  vii,  "On  Security  of  Goods"  (§§305-51),  contains 
nothing  that  calls  for  special  remark,  except  that  it  groups  with 
the  crimes  against  property  as  ordinarily  understood,  various 
injuries  to  possessions  through  oversight  [Versehen]  (§§337  S.). 
Under  the  latter  head,  Sonnenfels  discusses  protection  against 
damage  by  fire,  including  building-ordinances,  fire-departments, 
fire-insurance,  protection  against  lightning,  use  of  firearms 
and  fireworks,  ordinances  against  vagrants,  and  various  minor 
devices. 

Chap,  viii,  "On  Penalties"  (§§352-88),  although  not 
strictly  pertinent  to  our  purpose,  deserves  brief  notice  because 
it  contains  symptoms  of  the  independence  of  thought  about 
details  which  led  Roscher  to  apply  the  term  "eclectic."'^ 

Sonnenfels  begins  by  questioning  the  sufficiency  of  Grotius' 
explanation  of  legal  penalties,  viz.:  "Punishment  is  an  evil 
of  sensation  because  of  malice  of  action."  The  author 
comments: 

This  aphorism,  handed  down  from  writer  to  writer,  has  given  a 
one-sided  direction  to  reflection  upon  the  subject.  The  viewpoint 
from  which  the  judge  who  enforces  the  penalty  regards  it,  and  that 
of  the  law-giver  who  ordains  it  are  quite  different.  The  first  punishes 
because  the  law  was  disobeyed.  The  second  threatens  a  penalty 
in  order  that  the  law  may  not  be  disobeyed.    With  the  former  the 

>  Vide  pp.  481  S.  above. 


S20  THE  CAMERALTSTS 

penalty  is  a  consequence  of  the  conduct.  With  the  latter  the  conduct 
is  a  consequence  of  the  penalty.  With  the  first  the  affixing  of  penalty 
is  inculpation,  with  the  second  it  is  stimulus.  Penalty  therefore, 
considered  as  an  auxiliary,  to  protect  the  law,  namely,  by  exerting 
an  influence  upon  the  resolutions  of  actors,  and  by  supplying  the 
place  of  other  determining  motives,  is  an  evil  which  is  attached  to 
the  law  as  a  means  oj  influencing  against  infraction  of  the  same.  In 
determining  penalties,  attention  is  to  be  paid,  first,  to  the  quantity; 
second,  to  the  kind  of  the  same. 

The  attempt  to  find  a  principle  on  which  to  decide  the  former 
question  proceeds  by  considering  four  possible  criteria,  viz., 
the  conduct  itself,  its  relation  to  the  state,  its  consequences, 
or  its  motives;  and  it  reaches  the  conclusion  (§357):  "The 
general  means  of  measuring  punishment  is,  therefore,  to  be 
sought  only  in  the  motives  of  the  crime."  The  following 
specifications  are  deduced: 

"(i)  The  penalty  must  be  as  great  as  necessary  to  procure  the 
lawful  action  or  restraint;  (2)  The  penalty  must  not  be  greater  than 
necessary  to  procure  the  lawful  action;  (3)  The  strongest  deterring 
motive,  that  is,  the  most  effective  penalty,  will  always  be  that  which 
threatens  an  evil  in  direct  antithesis  with  the  motive  which  solicits 
to  the  crime."  In  explaining  the  appUcation  to  be  made  of  these 
principles,  Sonnenfels  recurs  to  his  classification  of  evils  to  be 
avoided,  or  of  "securities"  to  be  gained.  As  the  evils  have  refer- 
ence in  turn  to  civic  freedom,  honor,  goods,  and  corporal  integrity, 
the  penalties  should  correspond.  Thus,  they  should  be  variations 
of — "loss  of  all  civic  rights;  loss  of  social  standing  [Standesrechte]; 
loss  of  rights  of  the  family;  loss  of  legal  rights;  or,  in  sp)ecial 
cases,  banishment  from  the  country;  expulsion  from  the  locality; 
infamy;  degradation  [Standesentsetzung];  confiscation  of  goods; 
fines;  corporal  punishment,  from  minor  inflictions  to  the  death- 
penalty." 

Respecting  the  extreme  penalty,  Sonnenfels  energetically 
opposes  the  prevailing  opinions  and  practices.  He  repeats 
the  theorem  which  he  had  published  in  1764: 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  521 

Death  penalties  are  contrary  to  the  purpose  of  penalties.  Hard, 
incessant  public  labor  promises  much  more  for  that  purpose,  and 
at  the  same  time  makes  the  punishment  of  the  criminal  profitable 
for  the  state. ' 

One  paragraph  in  particular,  in  discussion  of  this  question, 
is  notable  more  for  its  wider  implications  than  for  its  immediate 
bearings.  Whether  its  author  was  aware  or  not  that  he  was 
betraying  tendencies  which  were  ominous  for  the  old  regime, 
it  is  evident  enough  from  our  present  viewpoint  that  we  have 
here  one  of  the  signs  that  absolutistic  preconceptions  were  losing 
some  of  their  hold.  On  justification  of  the  right  of  capital 
punishment  the  author  says  (§377): 

The  first  question  which  must  be  investigated  is  without  doubt 
in  respect  to  the  righi.  Has  the  law  a  right  to  punish  with  death  ? 
If  questions  have  been  raised  over  this  point,  it  was  because  writers 
have  fawned  upon  princes,  and  have  sought  the  source  of  this  right 
in  no  one  knows  what  form  of  a  majesty  derived  immediately  from 
heaven,  and  assigned  to  them  an  unlimited  right  over  life  and 
death.  The  source  of  this  awful  right  is  to  be  sought  nowhere  except 
in  the  individual  man,  whose  combination  constitutes  the  state. 
Man,  thought  of  in  the  natural  condition,  has  the  right  to  protect 
his  security  in  every  way,  and  if  the  violence  of  attack  cannot  other- 
wise be  warded  oflf,  it  is  his  right  to  carry  his  defense  even  to  the 
death  of  the  assailant.  In  civil  society  each  separate  member  has 
made  over  this  right  of  defense  to  the  whole,  that  is,  to  the  sovereign 
power  that  represents  the  whole;  that  is,  not  a  right  over  his  own 
life,  which  no  one  possesses,  but  the  right  of  each  over  the  life  of 
every  other  who  might  become  an  assailant.  In  that  way  the 
sovereign  power  acquired  the  right  over  all. 

Our  concern  is  not  with  the  validity  of  this  reasoning,  but 
with  the  fact  that  Sonnenfels  exhibited  a  tendency  to  think 

«  Reference  is  made  to  "die  vartreffliche  Abhandlung  des  Marchese 
Beccari:  Von  Verbrechen  und  Strafen,"  which  appeared  almost  simul- 
taneously with  the  publication  of  Sonnenfel's  first  edition,  and  supported 
his  position  on  this  subject. 


522  THE  CAMERALISTS 

for  himself  about  certain  parts  of  the  traditional  philosophy 
of  the  state. 

The  purpose  of  chap,  ix,  "On  Institutions  for  Maintaining 
Internal  Security,"  is  particularized  in  the  opening  paragraph 
(§389),  viz.: 

Under  the  name  institutions  we  include  all  persons  and  devices 
which  aim  at  prevention  and  discovery  of  every  action  harmful  to 
civic  security,  including  the  higher  as  well  as  the  lower  stations  and 
functionaries  that  have  to  do  in  any  way  with  guarding  the  peace, 
with  detecting  seditious  intentions,  or  dangerous  persons,  and  finally 
everything  which  has  to  do  with  punishment  of  the  same. 

As  a  survey  of  the  civic  structure  which  all  the  cameralists 
have  contemplated  with  variations  of  detail,  the  following 
paragraph  (§390)  is  useful,  viz.: 

As  the  prerogatives  of  Polizey  have  been  treated  in  this  work, 
the  law-giving  as  well  as  the  executive  power  lies  within  the  scope 
of  its  functions.  The  supreme  administration  of  the  same  can 
consequently  be  accredited  only  to  the  highest  station  in  the  state, 
whatever  be  the  name  under  which  it  exists.  This  is  the  directing 
guidance  of  the  state,  where  the  principal  laws  and  ordinances  are 
enacted.  Execution,  however,  is,  according  to  the  variety  of  the 
objects,  committed  to  subordinate  divisions.  Moreover,  the  public 
administration  usually  subdivides  affairs,  and  retains  for  itself 
law-giving,  at  least  in  general  affairs  of  the  country,  or  respecting 
other  more  important  matters;  it  turns  over  the  civil  and  criminal 
judiciary  functions  to  special  bodies,  or  so-called  Stellen,  and  restricts 
the  operations  of  Polizey  in  the  narrower  sense  to  maintenance  of 
the  public  peace,  good  order,  and  discipline,  to  superintendence 
over  measures,  weights,  markets,  cleanliness  of  cities,  institutions 
necessitated  by  the  various  dangers  and  accidents,  and  especially 
over  ever3rthing  which  demands  emergency  action.  Since  mention 
has  already  been  made  of  the  different  judicial  offices,  it  remains 
for  this  chapter  to  treat  only  of  this  last  significance  of  Polizey. 

The  chief  difference  between  Justi  and  Sonnenfels  in  this 
division  of  the  subject  is  not  that  they  disagree  in  principle. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  523 

but  that  Sonnenfels  has  scheduled  a  larger  number  of  concrete 
details  to  which  the  principles  apply,  and  that  these  specifica- 
tions have  the  effect  of  considerably  extending  the  apparent 
consequences  of  the  principles.  A  striking  instance  of  this  is 
the  argument  for  abolition  of  places  of  refuge  (§§410-15). 

Chap.  X,  "Use  of  the  Institutions  in  Case  of  Great  Accidents" 
furnishes  a  sort  of  title  for  activities  which  in  the  nature  of  the 
case  cannot  be  thoroughly  analyzed  nor  formulated,  and  no 
very  explicit  prescriptions  about  them  are  possible.  The  refer- 
ence is  to  occurrences  which  may  be  anticipated  in  kind,  but 
cannot  be  foreseen  in  time  and  place,  and  cannot  be  averted 
by  human  power.  The  sort  of  foresight  to  be  exercised  is 
suggested  by  the  questions,  What  sort  of  accidents  are  probable 
in  a  given  locality  ?  How  does  the  situation  affect  the  proba- 
bility of  such  accidents?  What  variations  of  the  probability 
are  there  at  different  times?  Among  such  accidents,  which 
permit  of  provisional  prevention  ?  Then  action  with  reference 
to  such  accidents  may  be  in  part  thought  out  in  advance  by 
dividing  the  calamity  into  stages,  and  by  determining  the  sort 
of  conduct  appropriate  in  each,  viz.,  (i)  before  the  actual 
case;  (2)  during  the  same;  (3)  after  the  same.  As  an  illus- 
tration, Sonnenfels  takes  the  case  of  a  freshet  in  the  Dan- 
ube at  Vienna,  and  specifies  a  programme  for  minimizing  the 
calamity,  before,  during,  and  after.  It  is  evident  that  this 
sketch  is  not  a  mere  academic  exercise,  but  it  has  the  same 
importance  for  civic  conditions  which  the  plans  of  a  commissary 
department  have  for  an  army. 

With  reference  to  the  volume  as  a  whole  the  curious  fact 
is  to  be  noted  that  no  one  who  had  not  been  advised  of  the 
author's  alleged  fundamental  principle  would  discover  a  sign 
of  it  in  any  paragraph  of  the  book  after  the  passage  in  which 
it  is  discussed  in  the  abstract.*  From  that  point  it  disappears, 
and  no  use  is  made  of  it  whatsoever.    A  student  of  Justi  who 

I  Vide  above,  p.  500. 


524  THE  CAMERALISTS 

omitted  the  first  forty-two  sections  of  the  present  volume, 
and  carefully  studied  the  remaining  three  hundred  and  ninety, 
would  probably  find  no  occasion  for  doubling  that  Sonnenfels 
was  completely  in  accord  with  his  predecessor  in  making  **the 
general  happiness"  the  criterion  of  civic  procedure.  The 
argument  does  not  close  here,  to  be  sure,  and  the  author  will 
find  a  use  for  his  alleged  criterion  later.  We  shall  return  to 
the  subject,  and  shall  find  it  instructive  about  the  unsettled 
condition  of  the  philosophy  of  which  it  was  a  symptom. 


CHAPTER  XX 
THE  CAMERALISM  OF  SONNENFELS  ("HANDLUNG") 

The  title-page  of  Sonnenfel's  second  volume,  Handlung, 
is  identical  with  that  of  Vol.  I,  Polizey,  except  that  the  vignette 
represents  "Fortbonnais."^  If  Sonnenfels  did  not  translate 
Forbonnais'  term  commerce  by  the  word  Handlung,  the  scope 
of  his  book  would  call  for  the  version  "industry,"  in  the  more 
general  sense  connoted  by  ordinary  American  usage,  not  in 
the  more  technical  sense  of  the  German  '^Industrie."  Although 
the  activities  discussed  include  gainful  occupations  in  general, 
Sonnenfels  prefers  to  consider  them  as  "commerce,"  and  that 
term  will  be  used  as  a  translation  of  his  word  Handlung.  If 
all  the  passages  in  which  it  occurs  were  collated,  they  would 
show  a  curious  lack  of  precision  in  his  analysis.  To  what 
extent  this  classification  of  economic  activities  of  diflEerent 
kinds  under  a  name  proper  to  some  of  them  and  not  to  others 
is  cause  or  efifect  of  important  economic  misconceptions  is  a 
query  which  we  merely  register,  without  attempting  to  oflfer 
an  answer. 

This  second  part  is  very  largely  a  discussion  of  technical 
phases  of  different  kinds  of  business,  more  than  investigation 
of  economic  principles  at  the  basis  of  all  business.  The  intro- 
ductory portions  of  the  book,  however,  show  traits  that  are 
highly  useful  in  marking  theoretical  tendencies. 

The  Preface  declares  that  this  "outline  of  political  com- 
mercial science'  was  not  written  for  men  in  business,  whose 

I  On  p.  4  of  the  Preface  the  edition  of  Forbonnais*  book  which ^ 
Sonnenfels  used  is  referred  to  as  "  Elimens  du  Commerce,  zweyte  Leydner 
Auflage." 

»  Umriss  der  politischen  Handlungswissenscha/i.  I  have  not  found 
this  expression  in  the  earlier  cameralists.  It  seems  to  me  to  be  in  itself 
a  sign  that  there  was  increasing  instability  in  the  notions  of  classification 

525 


526  THE  CAMERALISTS 

theories  have  been  established  by  long  experience,  and  have 
become  complete.     If  I  wish  to  leave  the  book  in  their  hands, 
it  is  only  in  order  that  I  may  be  corrected  by  them  if  any  errors 
have  escaped  my  knowledge." 
The  Preface  continues: 

My  ambition  limits  itself  to  the  young  friends  to  whom  my  calling 
commissions  me  as  a  guide.  If  I  have  in  some  measure  smoothed 
their  way  to  their  duty,  if  I  have  made  their  preparation  for  their 
calling  easier,  I  have  accomplished  my  purpose. 

As  an  index  of  the  intellectual  conditions  within  which 
Sonnenfels  wrote,  the  next  paragraph  is  instructive,  viz. : 

There  is  no  lack,  to  be  sure,  of  thorough  writings  on  the  subject 
of  commerce.  The  English  and  the  French  have  always  recognized 
the  importance  of  a  subject  which  may  be  regarded  as  the  foundation 
of  public  welfare'  [der  offenilichen  Wohlfahrt],  since  through  multi- 
plication of  means  of  subsistence  it  is  the  basis  of  population.  The 
greatest  men  in  all  sciences,  publicists  [Staatskiindige],  historians, 
philosophers,  have  made  contributions  to  the  explanation  of  com- 
merce. Mathematicians  have  believed  that  they  were  no  less  useful 
to  the  world  and  to  their  fatherland  when  they  spoke  of  the  advan- 
tages of  a  cloth  factory  than  when  they  analyzed  the  profound  theory 
of  the  infinite.  Their  writings  meanwhile  are  rather  for  the  already 
educated  readers  than  for  beginners.  It  appears  that  men  of  such 
ability  have  been  unable  to  put  themselves  on  the  level  of  the  untrained. 
Hence  the  obscurity  of  their  writings.  They  presuppose  knowledge 
of  which  the  uninitiated  have  no  comprehension.  The  latter  can- 
not grasp  conclusions  from  principles  which  they  do  not  understand. 

and  methodology.  Although  Sonnenfels  is  far  from  generalizing  eco- 
nomic problems  in  the  spirit  of  an  abstract  science,  the  prominence  and 
relative  independence  of  business  questions,  as  distinguished  from  fiscal 
problems,  is  a  still  more  meaning  sign  that  general  economic  problems 
were  approaching  the  threshold  of  consciousness. 

«  Perhaps  it  is  mere  fancy,  but  in  Sonnenfels'  usage  this  expression 
seems  to  me  to  connote  a  less  governmental  and  more  popular  center 
of  gravity  for  the  concept "  welfare "  than  was  indicated  by  the  corre- 
sponding terms  of  the  earlier  cameralists. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  527 

The  profound  author  of  the  Elements  of  Commerce  declares  at 
the  outset  that  he  did  not  write  for  those  who  read  only  to  save 
themselves  the  trouble  of  thinking.  If  Forbonnais  would  admit  only 
thinking  readers,  did  he  reflect  that  his  excellent  book  would  remain 
almost  unread  ?  I  take  the  liberty  of  confessing  that  my  intention 
is  precisely  the  opposite  of  his.  I  write  for  those  who  are  not  yet 
capable  of  thinking  for  themselves  on  this  subject.  This  book  is 
to  introduce  them  to  it.  My  purpose  is  to  prepare  readers  for  Forbon- 
nais. 

Sonnenfels  presently  schedules  the  Austrian  literature 
of  the  subject  as  follows: 

The  catalogue  of  writings  to  which  we  can  make  claim  as  a 
national  possession  may  be  read  at  a  glance.  It  comprises  in  all 
Oesterreich  Uber  cUles — mostly  credited  to  Homeck,  but  partly  to 
Becher;*  Schrbtters  FUrsUiche  Schatz-  und  Rentkammer;'  Meixner's 
Antnerkungen  Uber  die  Beschaffenheit  der  k.  k.  Erblande:^  a  book 
which  only  arouses  the  wish  that  such  a  work  might  be  undertaken  by 
a  more  competent  and  better  informed  man;  and  an  anomymous 
book  entitled,  Wahre  und  vortrefliche  Mittel,  wodurch  die  k.  k.  Erb- 
kdnigreiche  und  Ldnder  in  einen  glUcklicheren  und  florissanteren 
Zustand  gesetzt  werden  kdnnten,  under  which  much-promising 
inscription  everyone  would  be  likely  to  expect  more  than  five  pieces* 
which  are  shoved  together  without  connection  as  without  choice, 
and  of  which,  for  the  author's  sake,  I  will  attribute  the  much-profess- 
ing title  to  one  of  the  usual  publishers'  tricks  to  make  eight  paltry 
sheets  salable. 

I  Vide  pp.  129  £f.  above.  '  Vide  pp.  135  ff.  above. 

3  Not  mentioned  by  Roscher. 

4  Sonnenfels'  note:  "I.  Beweis,  dass  es  den  dsterreischen  Fabriken 
eben  so  leichl  seyn  werde,  ein  Konsumme  in  Pohlen  tu  finden,  als  der 
Churbrandenburg.  II.  Grilndliche  Anleitung  zu  regelmdssiger  Spren- 
gung  fester  Steinfelsen  u.s.w.  III.  K.  K.  Verordnung  Kirchengelder  und 
Kirchenrechnungen.  IV.  Ganser's  Abhandlung  von  Tor/erde.  V.  Vor- 
schlag  zur  Beleuchtung  der  StOdte."  The  author  adds:  "This  Preface 
was  written  in  1769.  Since  that  time  several  works  have  been  written 
wlilch  have  relations  to  the  Austrian  states." 


528  THE  CAMERALISTS 

Four  books,  or  eight,  if  we  reckon  Becher's  Bedenken  von 
Manufacturen  in  Deutschland,^  von  Vogemont's  (or  Bogemont's) 
Deutschlands  vermehrien  Wohlstand,  Boden's  FursUiche  Macht- 
kunst,'  and  Jorger's  Vota  Cameralia,  from  all  of  which  no  one  would 
be  able  to  gather  particularly  important  information.  These  are 
all  of  this  species,  however,  which  Austria  up  to  this  time  has  to  show. 
The  rest  of  Germany  is  not  rich  in  writings  of  distinction,  while  other 
nations  are  taught  about  all  parts  of  commerce  and  finance  by  the 
most  excellent  works.  ^ 

Not  less  instructive  is  Sonnenfels'  hypothesis  in  explanation 
of  Austria's  backwardness  in  this  respect  (Preface,  p.  8) : 

This  lack  may  have  its  cause  chiefly  in  the  difficulty  of  access 
to  those  sources  which  occasion  the  speculations  of  writers,  which 
guide  them,  which  must  necessarily  be  made  fundamental  by  them, 
in  so  far  as  their  works  are  not  to  remain  merely  indecisive  and 
mostly  inapplicable  thoughts.  The  strength  and  population,  the 
condition  of  commerce,  of  manufactures,  the  various  changes,  the 
occasions  of  the  same,  the  hindrances,  the  encouragements,  the 
increase  of  diligence,  the  condition  of  the  public  revenues,  of  the 
national  credit,  all  this  is  in  other  states  known  in  detail,  either  from 
public  registers  and  tables,  or  it  is  readily  made  known  to  those  who 
desire  to  inform  themselves  about  these  matters.  Competent  men 
then  look  upon  it  as  their  duty  not  to  withhold  from  the  state  their 
observations  about  the  same,  and  their  advice.  In  this  way,  as  it 
were,  a  whole  nation  unifies  its  insight.  The  number  of  its  coun- 
cilors is  in  certain  respects  not  smaller  than  the  number  of  its  thinking 
patriots. 

With  us  such  facts  are  still  regarded  as  state  secrets.    There 

'  I  am  unable  to  explain  this  title  except  on  the  assumption  that 
Sonnenfels  quoted  from  memory  and  meant  the  Diskurs.  Vide  above, 
pp.  109  ff. 

»   Vide  above,  pp.  1 70  ff. 

3  It  is  to  be  noticed  that  Sonnenfels  does  not  claim  Justi's  Staatswirth- 
schaft  for  Austria,  although  it  was  a  product  of  the  author's  work  in  that 
country.  It  was  not  devoted  particularly  to  Handlung,  to  be  sure,  but 
covered  the  subject  to  such  an  extent  that  the  omission  is  surprising. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  529 

may  be  many  important  grounds  for  this  reticence,  which  are  unknown 
to  me.  Meanwhile  I  can  cite  this  secrecy  in  general  as  the  cause 
of  that  dearth  of  political  writings,  the  number  of  which  I  wish  to 
increase  by  publishing  these  elements.  My  merit  may  perhaps  be 
very  slight,  if  a  one-sided  estimate  is  put  upon  the  worth  of  my  labor. 
If,  however,  judgment  is  so  generous  as  to  consider  the  intention, 
the  endeavor,  to  be  useful  at  my  post,  I  have  thereby  earned  at  least 
a  certain  measure  of  thanks. 

In  the  evolution  of  the  methodology  of  the  social  sciences 
in  Germany,  no  writer  seems  to  me  more  symptomatic  than 
Sonnenfels  of  the  tendency  toward  transition  from  a  technology 
of  civic  management,  with  the  interests  of  quasi-absolutistic 
governments  as  the  determining  aim  and  norm,  to  a  technology 
in  which  a  co-ordinate  position  among  the  aims  and  norms 
would  be  assigned  to  the  interests  of  economic  production,  and 
of  popular  welfare  in  a  more  modem  sense  than  that  which  was 
the  content  of  the  concept  "welfare"  in  the  philosophy  of  the 
quasi-absolutists.  For  this  reason,  the  entire  introduction 
to  this  volume — Handlung — must  be  adopted  into  this  survey. 
The  alternative  title  given  to  the  volume  at  this  point  is: 
Elements  of  the  Science  of  Commerce,  and  the  particular  sub- 
ject of  the  introduction  is  "The  Simplest  Concepts  of  Com- 
merce, and  its  Branches."* 

From  one  point  of  view,  the  work  in  a  pure  science  upon 
which  all  the  subsequent  details  and  applications  are  based, 
is  discovery  of  the  categories  in  which  the  facts  of  the  science 
have  to  be  thought.  The  methodology  of  a  positive  science 
is  a'  rhythmic  reaction  between  observation  of  isolated  facts 
and  generalization  of  those  facts  into  categories.  From  any 
stage  of  discovery  the  way  to  an  advanced  stage  is  through  pro- 
cesses of  further  analysis  of  facts  and  assembling  new  facts, 
to  learn  whether  the  relationships  in  which  the  facts  occur  are 

'  Grundsdlze  der  Handlungswissenschait,  Einleitung.  Die  einjach- 
slen  Begriffe  des  Handels  und  seine  Zweige. 


530  THE  CAMERALISTS 

generalized  in  a  valid  manner  in  the  categories  in  use.  A 
history  of  economic  science  might  with  advantage  be  written 
as  an  expansion  of  this  proposition.  Logically  antecedent 
to  all  quantitative  formulation  of  economic  laws  must  be  static 
formulation  of  the  structural  phases  of  economic  processes. 
Whatever  other  merits  or  demerits  may  be  attributed  to  the 
Smithian  type  of  economic  theory,  it  was  the  most  potent  factor 
in  nineteenth-century  thinking  in  stimulating  analysis  of  the 
elementary  economic  relationships,  and  of  bringing  into  use 
relatively  precise  terms  as  symbols  of  those  relationships. 

In  other  words,  a  first  step  in  passing  from  every  less  critical 
to  a  more  critical  stage  of  a  positive  science  consists  in  dis- 
placing less  adequately  analyzed  categories  for  more  adequately 
analyzed  categories,  as  the  qualitative  conceptions  of  the 
science.  From  our  present  point  of  view,  the  value  of  Sonnen- 
fels'  introduction  to  this  second  volume  consists  in  its  exhibit 
of  such  economic  categories  in  a  relatively  early  stage  of  their 
evolution.  Their  crudity  is  cumulative  evidence  in  support 
of  our  theorem  that  the  cameralists  are  radically  misunderstood 
if  we  interpret  them  as  economists  in  the  classical  sense  of  the 
term.  They  were  political  scientists  in  whose  minds  distinct 
economic  categories  were  not  differentiated  until  the  Smithian 
influence  became  a  variant  of  German  thinking.  Sonnenfels' 
owa  language  is  the  most  effective  commentary  on  this 
thesis  which  could  be  cited.  We  translate  his  introduction 
in  full: 

The  beneficent  influence  of  commerce  upon  general  happiness 
[allgemeine  Gliickseligkeit]  was  long  overlooked  by  political  philosophy 
[Staatsklugheit].  No  attention,  no  care,  no  promotion  was  supposed 
to  be  due  to  this  subject.  Not  as  though  Alexander,  even  in  the 
irresistible  course  of  his  victories,  had  not  cast  a  glance  upon  com- 
merce, and  after  the  destruction  of  Tyre  had  not  built  Alexandria 
as  the  emporium  of  eastern  and  northern  wares:  but  ministers  and 
monarchs  recognized  in  the  son  of  Philip  only  the  conqueror,  and 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  531 

only  in  that  character  did  he  seem  worthy  of  imitation.  Charles  V, 
Sully,  Elizabeth,  Colbert  first  enlightened,  cabinets  about  the  true 
advantages  of  commerce.  World-wisdom  lent  statecraft  its  insight. 
Men  who  had  received  from  Providence  the  calling  of  being  teachers 
of  the  nations  instructed  the  world  on  this  subject  in  deathless  writ- 
ings. Finally,  as  the  principle  gained  prevalence — the  happiness 
of  the  state  consists  in  the  number  of  its  citizens^ — people  began  to 
recognize  the  worth  of  a  business  [Geschaft]  which,  through  multi- 
plication of  the  means  of  support,  contributes  such  a  large  portion 
to  this  happiness.  Thereupon  commerce  became  an  affair  of  the 
cabinets.  Attention  was  given  to  the  principles  by  whose  application 
tfie  largest  number  of  people  may  be  supplied  with  occupation.  The 
collection  of  these  principles  constitutes  the  political  science  of  com- 
merce* Mercantile  [die  kaufmdnnische]  science  is  distinguished 
from  this  subject,  because  the  private  merchant  has  for  his  purpose 
the  increase  of  his  own  private  means,  without  thought  whether 
thereby  anything  accrues  to  the  general  advantage  of  the  state,  or 
whether  the  general  advantage  is  endangered.  Yet  the  political 
commerce  by  no  means  works  against  private  advantage.  The 
former  seeks  to  use  the  latter  as  a  tool  to  subordinate  it  as  a  means 
to  the  general  end:  that  is,  to  combine  the  advantage  of  the  state 
with  that  of  the  individual  citizen. ^ 

»  Vide  above,  pp.  500  and  523.  This  is  the  first  recurrence  of  the 
proposition. 

« Die  politische  Handlungswissenschaft.  The  phrase  is  a  snapshot 
at  the  struggle  for  survival  among  concepts.  The  predominant  problem 
still  was,  What  shall  the  government  do  about  commerce  ?  There  was 
not  yet  independent  analysis  of  commerce  itself,  apart  from  state 
policy. 

3  Sonnenfels'  note  to  this  paragraph  is  not  a  model  of  lucidity,  but 
it  must  be  quoted  to  complete  the  evidence  which  we  must  consider  in 
deciding  about  the  precise  stage  in  the  process  of  critical  analysis  which 
the  author  represents.  The  note  is  on  the  phrase,  politische  Handlungs- 
wissenschaft, and  it  reads  as  follows:  "The  multiplication  of  means 
of  support,  through  advantageous  exchange  of  that  which  nature  [das 
Erdreich]  and  diligence  produce,  is  taught  by  HamUungswissenschaft," 
(the  adjective  "political"  does  not  appear  at  this  point).    With  reference 


532  THE  CAMERALISTS 

The  occupation  [Bcschajiigung]  of  human  beings  has  for  its 
purpose  the  placing  in  their  hands  the  means  whereby  they  may 
provide  their  support.  They  derive  this  support  through  receiving 
something  as  compensation  for  that  which  they  produce  by  their 
occupation.*  Thus  barter  comes  into  existence,  and  this  is  the 
business  of  commerce  in  the  most  proper  sense  (§2). 

What  one  should  accept  as  a  compensation  for  that  which  one 
has  given  must  be  of  such  character  that  one  wants  it.  Want  [Bediirfen] 
is  here  not  to  be  understood  in  the  restricted  sense  which  misan- 
thropic worldly-wise  have  given  to  the  word.  Desire  [Verlangen]  for 
greater  comfort,  the  means  to  gratify  this  desire,  the  ability  to  find 
pleasure  in  possession  and  enjoyment  of  the  same,  are  not  without 
a  purpose  in  the  plan  of  nature.  They  are,  to  the  same  extent, 
not  without  a  purpose  in  the  plan  of  Staatsklugheit  (vide  §10 
below).  Want  [BedUrjniss]  means  accordingly  everything  the 
use  of  which  can  give  us  advantage  of  any  sort  whatever,  the 
possession  of  which  is  meanwhile  desired;  and  these  wants, 
whether  they  are  real  wants,  without  which  human  beings  could 
not  exist,  or  imaginary  wants,  which  the  customary  mode  of  life, 
the  standard  of  comfort  or  enjoyment,  the  pride  of  men,  have  made 

to  this  definition,  and  to  the  paragraph  just  quoted,  the  work  proceeds 
(Vol.  II,  p.  3):  "This  explanation  appears  to  vary  from  the  ordinary 
one;  i.  e.,  the  most  advantageous  exchange  of  products.  In  fact,  how- 
ever, it  leads  to  the  same.  For  precisely  this  more  advantageous  exchange 
occurs  in  order  to  keep  a  great  number  of  f>eople  employed.  Moreover, 
exchange  itself  is  the  business  of  commerce,  and  in  this  fact  is  to  be  found 
the  explanation  of  the  science  which  guides  this  business.  Commerce 
will  also  be  regarded  as  the  means  of  increasing  the  resources  [Vermogen] 
of  the  state.  The  increased  wealth  of  the  slate  is  a  constant  consequence 
of  commerce,  but  not  the  ultimate  purpose  in  the  estimate  of  the  state 
to  which  riches  without  citizens  would  be  useless." 

'  Even  the  word  "produce"  is  likely  to  have  the  effect  of  an  anachro- 
nism when  used  as  a  translation  of  terms  employed  at  this  period.  The 
word  in  this  case  is  " hervorbringen."  " Erzeugen,"  "erzielen"  {vide 
below,  pp.  534,  551,  and  558),  "verdienen,"  "gewinnen,"  and  similar 
synonyms,  with  their  derivatives,  occur  without  the  precise  technical 
force  of  the  English  "produce,"  "production,"  etc. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  533 

desirable,  are  equally  an  object  of  exchange  through  which  wants 
are  traded  for  wants  (§3).^ 

If  that  which  one  can  give  for  that  which  is  offered  were  of  such 
a  sort  that  it  were  everywhere  found  in  abundance,  it  would  have 
no  compensating  worth,  and  by  means  of  it,  therefore,  no  exchange 
could  occur.  The  object  offered  in  exchange  must  accordingly  be 
something  which  he,  with  whom  the  exchange  is  to  occur,  wants  and 
does  not  possess,  or  at  any  rate  does  not  possess  in  the  quantity  which 
he  desires.  That  is,  it  must  be  relatively  rare.  Commerce  is  thus 
a  business  which  owes  its  origin  to  a  reciprocal  want.  What  one 
may  offer  to  another  for  the  satisfaction  of  a  want,  is  called  a  ware 
[Waare]  (§4). 

In  the  exchange  of  wares  many  sorts  of  hindrances  presently 
appear.  It  is  possible  that  he  who  desires  to  acquire  a  ware  cannot 
offer  for  it  precisely  the  ware  which  the  other  party  wants  at  the 
moment,  or  in  the  quantity  in  which  it  is  offered,  and  the  offered 
ware  is  either  entirely  incapable  of  division,  or  the  division  diminishes 
its  worth.  In  such  a  case  one  must  seek  to  secure  what  one  wants 
through  a  series  of  exchanges.  Then  again,  that  which  one  pos- 
sesses may  be  of  such  a  nature  that  it  cannot,  without  difficulty  or  de- 
terioration, be  transferred  from  one  place  to  another;  the  want  may 
be  so  imperative  that  one  cannot  wait  for  the  circuit  of  exchanges. 
These  difficulties  presently  led  men  to  look  around  for  a  means  by 
which  the  difficulties  might  be  avoided,  and  exchange  be  made  easy. 
Something  was  sought  which  might,  as  it  were,  take  the  place  of  all 
wares,  and  be  regarded  as  a  universal  equivalent  [Entgelt]  for  the 
same.  Not  any  stuff  whatever  could  be  adopted  arbitrarily  as  such 
equivalent.  Each  of  the  qualities  which  was  sought  in  the  same 
should  be  a  recourse  against  one  of  the  indicated  difficulties  of 
exchange,  and  these  difficulties  pointed  to  that  stuff  in  which  the 
qualities  were  found  united  (§5). 

In  order  to  relieve  wants  in  as  small  portions  as  was  necessary 

"  In  a  context  of  this  sort  Bedurfnisse  might  more  properly  be 
rendered  "necessities,"  but  in  other  cases  the  translation  "want"  is 
nearer  to  the  sense.  I  use  it,  therefore,  as  the  most  available  equivalent, 
although  the  subjective  and  objective  phases  of  the  words  cannot  always 
be  fitted  in  the  translation  to  the  original. 


534  THE  CAMERALISTS 

according  to  circumstances,  that  which  was  adopted  as  the  general 
equivalent  must  necessarily  be  capable  of  very  great  divisibility 
without  loss  of  worth.  Since,  csf)ecially  after  the  extension  of  com- 
merce, the  objects  of  exchange  often  had  to  be  carried  long  distances, 
durability  and  imperishability  were  demanded,  both  in  order  that 
in  the  exchange  itself,  or  in  going  from  hand  to  hand,  it  might  not 
be  used  up,  and  also  in  order  that,  without  danger  of  deterioration, 
it  might  be  saved  up.  In  order  that  the  carriage  should  not  be  difficult 
it  must  be  rare.  In  this  way  a  small  piece  became  an  equivalent  for  a 
considerable  bulk  of  wares.  At  the  same  time  a  great  sum  could  be 
sent  in  a  small  space.  But  it  is  probable  that  only  after  many  unsuc- 
cessful attempts  would  the  peoples  discover  the  combination  of  these 
qualities  in  the  precious  metals,  which  had  elsewhere  been  sought 
in  vain.  And  therein  lies  the  cause  of  the  almost  universal  agree- 
ment of  the  nations  about  gold  and  silver,  which  now  are  regarded 
as  the  representatives  of  wares,  and  are  called  money  (§6). 

After  the  introduction  of  money,  to  be  sure,  the  turn-over  [Umsaiz] 
was  no  longer  called  barter,'  but  purchase.  But  this  change  in  the 
words  (sic!)  did  not  essentially  change  the  "commerce."  The 
money  did  not  thereby  come  otherwise  into  consideration  than  in  so 
far  as  it  represented  those  wants,  or  wares,  which  at  another  time 
could  be  procured  for  it.  The  thing  accomplished  by  the  "com- 
merce" is  still  always  the  exchange  of  one  ware  for  another,  or  for 
the  representative  of  a  ware  (§7). 

Wares  with  which  exchange  is  effected  are  either  immediately 
usable  in  their  original  form,  or  they  must  be  transformed  for 
use  by  artificial  labor.  The  occupation  which  devotes  itself  to 
obtaining  [Erzielung]  the  former  is  rural  management  [Land- 
wirthschajt].  It  embraces  the  natural  produce  of  the  earth,  of 
grazing,  and  of  the  waters.  The  occupation  which  makes  the 
natural  products  usable  through  imparting  an  artificial  form, 
or  which  multiplies  their  use,  is  called  Manujaktur.'    The  manu- 

'  In  the  previous  sections  Sonnenfels  had  several  limes  used  the  same 
word — Tausch — in  the  more  general  sense  of  "exchange."  This  is  the 
first  time  in  which  the  restricted  meaning  is  strictly  correct. 

» In  a  note  the  author  adds:  "Purists"  (I  do  not  know  whether  his 
use  of  the  term  "Puritaner"  in  this  sense  was  an  intentional  or  an  uncon- 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  535 

factures  are  dependent  upon  land  management.  The  first  attention 
of  the  state  must  therefore  be  given  to  this  latter.  What  land 
management  furnishes  to  the  manufactures  is  called  raw  materials 
orstufiFs  (§8). 

The  original  commerce  consists  therefore  in  the  produce  ox  the 
earth  and  of  artificial  labor,'  so  far,  that  is,  as  both  come  to  the 
assistance  of  wants;  and  in  those  who  devote  themselves  with  their 
produce,  who  furnish  the  means,  of  providing  in  turn  their  own 
wants.  This  enables  us  to  determine  the  extent  of  general  com- 
merce. It  is  equal  to  the  sum  of  the  wants  of  all  consumers  [Ver- 
zehrefiden].*  In  order  to  extend  commerce,  either  the  wants  or  the 
consumers  must  be  increased  (§9). 

The  wants  of  human  beings,  as  already  observed,  are  very  limited, 
if  we  attach  to  the  word  the  strictest  concept  of  real  wants.  But 
in  that  case  the  occupations  of  the  citizens  will  be  kept  within  the 
same  narrow  bounds.  The  multiplication  of  wants  occurs  through 
introduction  of  comforts  and  of  superfluity,  both  of  which  make 
luxury.  All  declamations  against  luxury,  therefore,  are  either  not 
well  considered,  or  the  objections  which  are  urged  against  it  are  not 
really  directed  so  much  against  luxury,  as  against  the  one-sided  waste- 
fulness on  the  part  of  a  few,  while  the  other  portion  of  the  nation 
ekes  out  a  miserable  existence.     Luxury,  in  so  far,  on  the  one  hand, 

scious  solecism)  "in  the  vocabulary  of  commerce  speak  of  Manu/aklur 
when  hammer  and  fire  are  not  used,  as  Tuchmanufaktur,  CoHonmanu- 
faktur.  On  the  other  hand,  where  these  two  are  necessary,  that  is  called 
Fabriken,  Stahlfabriken,  Messing fabriken.  Usage  has  almost  abolished 
this  distinction.  The  word  Fabrik  is  more  general.  We  hear  daily 
Tuchfabrik,  CoUonfabrik" 

'  An  expla»natory  note  adds:  "The  word  Kunslarbeit  will  conslaiuly 
be  contrasted  with  LandwirtHschaft  in  order  to  indicate  llic  class  of 
Manufacluranten."  We  may  translate  this  obviously  inaj^propriate 
term,  "suppliers,"  as  a  mean  between  "manufacturers"  which  offends 
modern  usage  if  it  includes  farmers;  and  "producers"  which  would 
attribute  to  Sonnenfels  a  generalization  that  he  had  not  made.  "The 
word  diligence  [Aemsigkeit]  will  also  be  used." 

»  The  author's  note  reads:  "The  total  of  commerce  is  thus  the 
sum  of  two  magnitudes,  the  wants  and  the  number  of  consumers." 


536  THE  CAMERALISTS 

as  it  increases  the  wants  of  citizens,  and  thereby  perhaps  makes  it 
harder  for  some  to  support  themselves,  increases  on  the  other  liand 
the  occupations;  thus  it  incidentally  makes  gainful  occupations 
easier  and  more  numerous;  that  is,  the  sup)erfluity  of  one  satisfies 
the  wants  of  others.  And  if  here  and  there  a  citizen  does  not  know 
how  to  limit  his  outlays  by  the  rules  of  private  prudence,  and  ruins 
himself,  his  wasted  resources  are,  in  the  first  place,  no  loss  for  the 
state,  because  they  merely  pass  out  of  one  hand  into  the  other,  or  are 
transferred  to  many  persons;  second,  the  ruin  of  the  one  may  per- 
haps  have  provided  the  support  of  ten  families  of  the  laboring  class 
of  the  nation.  With  this  explanation  all,  even  the  most  plausible, 
objections  to  luxury  may  be  answered  (§io). 

At  the  same  time,  however,  the  boundaries  between  useful  and 
harmful  luxury  may  be  determined.  For  without  doubt  there  is  a 
sort  of  luxury  which  is  harmful.  All  luxury,  for  example,  is  harmful, 
which  contradicts  the  purpose  for  the  sake  of  which  the  state  should 
encourage  it,  which  does  not  increase  the  sum  of  national  occupations, 
but  diminishes  it.  This  occurs  in  the  case  of  unnecessary  foreign 
articles  of  luxury  and  also  in  the  case  of  those  which  are  not  made 
in  the  country  itself,  because  these  foreign  wares  always  take  the  place 
of  a  national  ware,  and  crowd  the  latter  out  of  the  sum  of  national 
occupations.  One  case  only  deserves  to  be  regarded  as  an  exception, 
viz.,  when  the  foreign  article  of  luxury  has  come  in,  not  by  purchase 
but  in  exchange  for  a  ware  produced  at  home.  In  this  instance 
justice  is  done  in  advance  both  to  national  consumption  and  to  all 
demands  of  the  foreigners  who  wanted  to  acquire  it  by  purchase  or 
in  exchange  for  wants.  In  this  case,  however,  it  is  only  the  extension 
of  a  branch  of  the  occupation.  The  foreign  article  of  luxury  takes 
the  place  of  the  national  product  (§ii). 

The  outlay  that  is  restricted  to  domestic  products  cannot  be 
increased  without  end.  The  resources  of  those  who  use  these  prod- 
ucts, and  their  number,  constitute  their  necessary  limits.  Commerce 
would  thus  not  be  greater  than  the  possible  national  consumption. 
There  remains,  however,  the  extension  of  the  same  on  another 
side,  through  increase  of  consumption.  Takers  of  the  wares  will 
be  sought  outside  the  country.  The  effort  is  made  to  supply  other 
nations  with  what  they  need,  and  through  their  consumption  to 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  537 

increase  the  sum  of  national  occupation.  Commerce  thus  divides 
itself  into  domestic  and  foreign.  Domestic  commerce  is  that  which 
is  carried  on  between  the  members  of  a  state  (§12). 

Foreign  commerce  is  carried  on  with  foreigners.  It  must  neces- 
sarily be  based  on  domestic  commerce,  and  it  must  give  up  something 
to  foreigners  only  when  it  has  first  satisfied  the  national  wants.  Thus 
foreign  commerce  is  carried  on  only  with  the  surplus;  that  is,  with 
that  which  the  national  consumption  can  spare.  On  the  other 
hand  a  nation  will  take  either  only  such  wares  as  it  really  needs, 
or  those  to  the  taking  of  which  it  is  drawn  by  powerful  stimuli. 
These  two  grounds  determine  takers  in  general,  but  a  state  will  be 
moved  to  take  from  precisely  this  nation,  inasmuch  as  the  same 
wares  may  actually  be  had  from  several  sides,  only  through  the  most 
advantageous,  or  the  least  disadvantageous  conditions  under  which 
a  ware  is  offered.  These  conditions  aflFect  the  price  of  wares,  or 
their  qualities  (§13). 

Scarcely  any  state  or  nation,  at  least  under  present  circumstances, 
and  with  the  once  introduced  mode  of  life,  will  be  sufficient  unto 
itself.  What  it  does  not  possess,  it  must  try  to  get  from  abroad 
under  the  least  oppressive  conditions.  To  this  end  external  com- 
merce furnishes  its  aid,  and  in  accordance  with  the  division  of  its 
occupation  it  is  divided  into  two  branches,  viz.,  export  and  import. 
It  carries  out,  from  the  surplus;  it  brings  in  for  a  double  purpose,  either 
to  use  the  imported  articles  itself,  or  to  export  them  again,  with 
advantage,  to  other  nations  (§14). 

This  last  makes  a  third  branch  of  commerce,  re-export  [Wieder- 
ausfuhr],  called  economic  commerce  [okonomische  Handlung].  If  its 
advantage  consisted  only  in  the  occupation  of  persons  engaged  in  trade, 
and  in  the  increase  of  navigation  or  of  wainage,  re-export  would  even 
then  be  highly  important  for  a  state.  It  would  be  giving  occupation  to 
a  part  of  the  citizens  at  the  cost  of  other  nations.  But  this  is  not  the 
whole  of  the  advantage,  and  the  re-exporting  state  increases  thereby 
the  national  stock  [Nationalhauptstamm]  to  the  extent  of  the  excess 
of  the  selling  price  over  the  price  of  purchase,  which  is  always  a  na- 
tion's gain  if  it  may  not  always  be  the  gain  of  the  merchant  (§15).' 

'  A  note  explains  the  last  clause  as  follows:  "A  merchant  buys 
cloth  for  10  in  England;  the  national  capital  is  diminished  by  10.     The 


538  THE  CAMERALISTS 

The  less  a  nation  has  to  receive  from  others  for  its  own  wants, 
and  the  more  sales  it  can  make  to  other  nations,  the  more  advan- 
tageous is  its  commerce.  But  the  situation  in  dififerent  regions  does 
not  always  afford  to  countries  either  the  requisite  quantity  or  the 
variety  of  wares  necessary  for  their  own  consumption  and  for  export. 
The  commercial  states,  particularly  the  maritime  provinces,  turned 
their  gaze  in  consequence  toward  the  islands,  sought  to  subjugate 
the  same,  and  to  secure  possession  through  settlers  transplanted 
thither,  whence  they  have  the  name  colonies,  or  settlements  [Pflanz- 
orter].  Thence  they  may  now  draw  a  part  of  their  wants,  independ- 
ent of  other  states  and  under  self-imposed  conditions,  and  they  may 
increase  without  limit  the  stuff  to  be  exported  thither  (§i6). 

The  wants  which  are  obtained  from  other  states,  and  that  which 
is  sent  abroad,  must  be  transported  to  the  place  of  sale.  This  trans- 
portation, which  is  denoted  by  the  word  "carriage"  [Fracht],  may 
occur  in  various  ways.  The  nation  receives  its  own  wants  through 
foreign  carriage;  and  foreigners  bring  that  which  they  are  to  receive 
by  their  own  carriage;  or  the  nation  brings  in  by  its  own  carriage  what 
it  receives  from  others,  and  returns  by  its  own  carriage  what  other 
nations  buy.  In  the  former  case  the  nation  loses  the  whole  advan- 
tage of  the  occupation,  which  reciprocal  carriage  was  capable  of 
creating;  and  its  commerce  is  thus  in  a  certain  sense  passive.  In 
the  second  case  the  nation  appropriates  this  advantage  and  its  com- 
merce becomes  more  active.  Every  nation  must  therefore  seek  to 
receive  its  wants  through  its  own  carriage  and  to  deliver  exports  to 
other  nations  with  its  own  carriage  (§17). 

Carriage  is  by  land  or  by  water.  Land  carriage  depends  on 
good  commercial  roads  and  a  well-conducted  carrying  system  (§18). 

Water  carriage  is  on  rivers  or  on  the  sea.  River  navigation  is 
promoted  by  making  and  keeping  rivers  navigable,  and  by  uniting 
rivers  by  means  of  canals  and  locks.  These  arrangements  cannot 
be  extended  beyond  the  boundaries  of  a  state.     Sea  carriage,  on  the 

merchant  pays  for  freight  i,  for  storage,  handh'ng,  etc.,  3,  so  that  the 
cloth  stands  the  merchant  at  14;  but  because  the  ship  was  a  national 
ship,  and  the  other  outlays  were  within  the  country,  or  paid  to  citizens, 
the  national  capital  has  not  lost  these  4.  The  merchant  sells  the  cloth 
for  18.     The  nation  gains  8,  the  merchant,  however,  only  4." 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  539 

contrary,  is  of  incomparably  greater  extent.  It  depends  upon  a 
well-organized  and  supported  merchant-marine   (§19). 

The  danger  of  carrying,  especially  at  sea,  would  of  itself  frighten 
from  undertakings,  because  only  few  have  enough  courage  to  risk 
their  whole  resources,  or  a  considerable  portion  of  them,  for  a  gain 
which  is  in  no  proportion  to  the  possible  and  often  very  probable 
loss.*  The  costs  of  carriage  would  also  mount  very  high  on  account 
of  this  consideration,  because  the  carrier  would  take  into  account 
the  risk  which  he  undertook.  The  danger  of  carriage  may  be 
approximately  estimated,  and  according  to  this  estimate  the  goods 
and  ships  may  be  made  secure  for  a  proportional  compensation. 
From  this  making  secure  the  business  has  the  name  insurance  or 
assurance,  whereby  the  courage  for  commercial  undertakings  is 
produced  and  increased  (§20). 

In  the  most  favorable  situation  of  a  state,  it  is  not  possible  greatly 
to  extend  commerce,  or  to  maintain  already  extensive  commerce, 
without  a  corresponding  sum  of  money.  The  presence  of  money  is 
necessary  from  two  points  of  view:  the  state  must  in  general  not 
lack  money  as  a  promoter  of  national  exertion;  in  particular  com- 
merce must  not  lack  an  adequate  fund  for  its  undertakings  (§21). 

The  physical  presence  of  money  in  a  state  does  not  give  to  enter- 
prise the  energy  which  comports  with  the  purpose  of  commerce. 
It  is  necessary  that  the  money  shall  do  its  work,  and  shall  circulate 
among  the  members  of  society.  It  is  therefore  a  special  duty  of  the 
state  to  promote  the  circulation,  and  to  remove  all  hindrances  which 
might  obstruct  the  same  (§22). 

In  case,  however,  for  whatever  cause,  the  circulating  sum  of 
money  is  either  insufficient,  or  diminished,  means  must  be  sought 
to  replace  the  deficiency.  The  work  [Verrichtung]  of  money  is  as 
follows:  to  be  to  its  possessors  the  reliable  representation  of  a  certain  quan- 
tity 0}  wares,  to  the  effect  that  whenever  it  pleases  them  they  may  exchange 
the  representation  for  that  which  is  represented.  If  it  is  possible  for  a 
state  to  succeed  in  procuring,  for  verbal  consent,  or  for  certain  other 
signs,  the  same  confidence,  that,  as  money  represented  the  wares, 
these  signs  represent  the  money,  these  arbitrary  signs  will  then  accom- 
«  This  is  almost  an  exact  repetition  of  Justi,  but  the  proposition  was 
probably  a  commonplace  at  the  time. 


S40  THE  CAMERALISTS 

plish  the  work  of  money,  and  will  temporarily  make  up  completely 
for  its  absence.  No  care  will  therefore  be  too  great  which  the  ruler 
may  devote  to  the  maintenance  of  public  confidence  (§23). 

If  commercial  enterprises  are  to  be  carried  on  energetically,  they 
will  require  great  sums.  Only  a  few  individual  citizens  in  a  state 
have  the  means  or  the  credit,  and  those  who  have  both  have  not 
always  resolution  enough  to  risk  so  much  in  undertakings  from  which 
to  be  sure  great  gain  may  be  expected,  which  however  are  always 
exposed  to  an  uncertain  outcome.  Where  the  means  of  individuals 
are  not  sufficient,  an  association  is  formed,  each  member  of  which 
risks  only  a  small  sum  the  more  resolutely  because  in  any  event 
the  loss  would  not  impair  his  fortune;  and  yet  the  total  of  these 
separate  contributions  procures  for  commerce  the  adequate  fund. 
The  commercial  associations  accordingly  contribute  a  large  portion 
to  the  extension  of  commerce  (§24). 

Through  export  to  foreigners  and  import  from  foreigners  the 
commercial  nations  become  reciprocal  debtors.  The  discharge  of 
these  debts  with  ready  money  would  be  expensive,  through  the  car- 
riage of  the  money  to  the  place  of  payment,  and  also  dangerous;  the 
money  in  carriage  would  be  a  considerable  time  unused,  and  the 
business  of  commerce  would  be  plunged  into  tedious  straggling  [Weit- 
Idufigkeit].  It  is  possible  to  avoid  these  difficulties  in  whole  or  in 
p&n,  if  a  state  exchanges  its  claims  with  another,  whereby  it  dis- 
charges its  debts  in  so  far  as  the  condition  of  their  commerce  with 
each  other  permits.  This  exchange  of  reciprocal  claims  gave  rise 
to  the  business  of  dealing  in  exchange,  which  to  be  sure  is  only  a 
private  affair,  but  it  is  always  worthy  of  public  attention,  because 
it  either  facilitates  or  retards  general  commerce,  and  in  addition  fur- 
nishes useful  information  for  the  guidance  of  the  same  (§25). 

In  the  present  situation  of  science  and  knowledge,  all  cabinets 
are  in  such  wise  enlightened  about  the  great  influence  of  commerce 
that  each  nation  must  expect  to  be  crossed  [durchkreuzt]  in  all  under- 
takings by  the  states  with  which  commerce  is  carried  on,  or  through 
whose  territory  the  commerce  will  take  its  course,  whenever  it  runs 
counter  to  their  purposes.  It  is  necessary  to  anticipate  these  hin- 
drances, and  at  favorable  opportunities,  by  means  of  negotiation,  to 
assure  advantageous  conditions  both  for  oneself  and  against  other 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  541 

rivals.  Commercial  treaties  consequently  constitute  an  important 
part  of  Handlungspolitik  (§16). 

In  order  to  know  the  status  of  commerce  in  itself  and  relatively 
and  therefrom  to  conclude  whether  the  course  of  affairs  conduces  to 
the  utmost  expansion  of  population,  states  compare  the  amount 
which  they  have  supplied  to  others  with  that  which  they  have  received. 
This  comparison  of  import  and  export  is  called  the  balance:  the 
plumb  line  in  the  hands  of  the  state  to  show  where  and  in  what  parts 
commerce  requires  special  aid  (§27). 

From  the  foregoing  merely  general  concepts  we  see  how  numerous 
and  far  reaching  are  the  knowledge,  purposes,  combinations,  and 
plans  which  must  be  made  the  basis  of  advantageous  commerce; 
and  the  necessity  of  controlling  this  important  business  through  the 
combined  insight  of  capable  men,  and  incidentally  of  establishing 
for  the  conduct  of  commerce  a  special  Kollegium,  or  a  special  Sielle, 
is  thus  very  obvious.  The  name  in  itself  is  a  matter  of  indifference, 
but  this  Kollegium  must  embrace  in  the  circuit  of  its  activity  every- 
thing which  can  promote  the  advantage  of  commerce  (§28). 

The  most  important  features  of  the  main  argument  in  this 
volume  are  discussed  in  the  next  chapter. 


CHAPTER  XXI 

THE  CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS 
("HANDLUNG  UND  FINANZ") 

In  two  or  three  particulars  more  direct  light  is  focused 
on  factors  of  firstrate  importance  for  our  argument  by  chaps, 
i  and  ii  of  Sonnenfels'  second  volume,  than  by  an  equal  portion 
of  any  of  the  works  thus  far  reviewed. 

In  the  first  place  a  relatively  minor  matter  of  methodology 
deserves  passing  remark.  Chap,  i,  on  rural  management, 
occupies  ii6  pages,  and  chap,  ii,  on  manufactures,  157  pages: 
a  total  of  273  out  of  the  564  pages  in  the  body  of  the  book. 
Attention  is  called  to  this  division  as  a  commentary  on  the 
lack  of  precision  in  the  title  Handlung  which  for  reasons  stated 
above  we  are  obliged  to  render  ''commerce."''  It  must  be 
said,  on  the  other  hand,  that  a  considerable  portion  of  chap,  ii 
is  concerned  with  relations  of  manufacture  to  trade,  primarily 
domestic,  so  that  commerce  in  the  strict  sense  creeps  into  the 
discussion  earlier  than  the  titles  of  chapters  would  indicate. 
Nor  is  the  mere  proportion  of  pages  given  to  various  topics 
a  safe  guide  to  the  logical  value  assigned  to  different  portions 
of  subject-matter.  It  remains  true,  however,  that  Sonnenfels' 
classification  of  material  under  the  term  Handlung  was  ex- 
tremely uncritical. 

In  the  second  place,  it  must  be  admitted  that  we  are  not 
entitled  to  infer  from  a  book  of  this  type  anything  very  specific 
about  the  actual  administrations  for  which  the  book  offers 
a  technology.  To  what  extent  the  government  of  the  German 
states  as  a  whole,  or  of  any  of  them,  approached  the  ideal  set 
forth  in  Sonnenfels'  theory  must  be  determined  by  other  sorts 
of  evidence.    Neither  the  original  sources  nor  even  the  second- 

»  Vide  above,  p.  525. 

542 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  $43 

ary  authorities  on  this  line  of  evidence  can  be  brought  within 
the  compass  of  our  present  argument ;  the  former,  because  they 
are  inaccessible  to  investigators  on  this  side  the  ocean,  the  latter, 
because  a  digest  of  the  material  would  require  a  separate 
volume.  We  must  repeat  then  that  we  have  to  do  merely 
with  the  theory  of  cameral  administration  as  it  appeared  in  the 
literary  versions. 

With  these  qualifications,  we  may  state  positively,  third, 
that  one  must  be  disqualified  by  invincible  prejudice  if  candid 
study  of  this  book  did  not  arouse  a  certain  degree  of  admiration 
for  the  comprehensiveness,  and  prudent  attention  to  details, 
involved  in  the  ideals  of  cameralism.  By  comparison  with 
administrations  which  attempted  anything  approaching  the 
systematic  and  thorough  management  here  outlined,  democracy 
as  practiced  in  America  has  been  slovenly,  improvident,  and 
reckless. 

In  the  fourth  place,  this  second  volume  reflects  at  its  best 
the  fundamental  cameralistic  conception  of  the  state.  With- 
out referring  to  the  more  abstract  legal  theories  of  the  relation 
of  the  concepts  "state,"  ''government,"  "people,"  etc.,  the 
working  resultant  of  all  these  was  an  assumption  of  a  com- 
munity pictured  as  a  great  landed  estate,  'which  was  such  a 
unity  that  every  part  and  member  had  to  be  considered  as 
having  an  importance  for  the  whole,  and  the  task  of  the  admin- 
istration of  the  whole  was  to  see  that  nothing  was  neglected 
which  might  serve  to  insure  that  efficiency  of  every  resource 
within  the  whole  which  might  contribute  to  the  well-being  of 
the  aggregate.  Whatever  our  philosophical  preconceptions, 
they  are  tending  toward  a  common  expression  in  terms  of  values 
ascertained  and  agreed  upon  in  the  course  of  experience. 
Certain  things  are  found  to  be  worth  while.  If  other  things 
interfere  with  those  which  we  judge  to  be  worth  while,  they 
must  drop  out  of  competition  and  give  place  to  the  more  highly 
valued  things.    Suppose  a  modem  democrat  has  no  tolerance 


544  THE  CAMERALISTS 

whatsoever  for  the  basic  political  philosophy  of  cameralism. 
He  could  hardly  be  intolerant  enough  to  deny  that  in  this  book 
Sonnenfels  has  done  something  worthy  of  praise.  He  has 
drawn  a  wonderfully  farsighted  and  inclusive  sketch  of  things 
that  people  must  learn  to  provide  for,  in  some  way  or  other, 
before  they  can  make  the  most  of  life.  It  is  difficult  to  show 
this  without  reproducing  his  discussion  in  detail,  but  the  follow- 
ing pages  contain  an  attempt  to  digest  the  argument  in  a  way 
that  will  confirm  this  estimate. 

At  the  same  time  our  purpose  calls  for  attention  to  the 
embryonic  state  of  the  concepts  employed  in  the  argument. 
We  must  keep  in  mind  that  Sonnenfels'  problems  were  not  our 
problems.  His  social  science  did  not  correspond  precisely 
with  any  division  or  definition  of  social  science  today,  much 
more  than  the  "rhetoric"  of  the  schoolmen  tallied  with  any 
field  of  knowledge  recognized  in  modem  classifications. 
Especially  must  we  discriminate  between  the  administrative 
problems  which  he  proposed  and  problems  of  pure  eco- 
nomics. The  latter  are  implicit  in  the  former,  but  as  we 
have  repeatedly  pointed  out,  we  misinterpret  and  misvalue 
the  theories  of  this  period  if  we  construe  them  as  theorems 
applied  by  their  authors  to  the  more  general  problems  of  the 
abstract  economists. 

The  last  proposition  is  in  order  at  once,  when  we  begin 
to  examine  the  concept  Landwirthschaft  (chap.  i).  Neither 
in  England  nor  in  America  does  anything  exist  today  which 
quite  corresponds  with  the  activities  which  Sonnenfels  included 
under  the  term.  Let  us  render  it  as  we  have  in  previous  cases, 
"rural  management."  The  term  applies,  however,  to  a  con- 
ception of  the  situation  which  it  is  difficult  for  Americans  to 
keep  in  mind.  The  whole  national  territory  is  presumed  to 
be  virtually  a  farm,  to  be  operated  for  the  advantage  of  the 
state;  and  it  is  the  right  and  duty  of  the  government  to  see 
that  every  foot  of  the  farm  is  thriftily  cultivated.    The  occu- 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  545 

pants  of  the  soil  are  regarded  as  indentured  to  the  slate,  and  it 
is  the  right  and  duty  of  the  government  to  dispose  of  their 
labor-ability  so  as  to  make  the  land  most  fruitful,  just  as  it  is 
the  business  of  the  managers  of  a  modern  factory  to  organize 
the  help  so  that  their  combined  labor  will  be  most  jjrofitable 
for  the  company.  That  is,  "rural  management"  connoted  to 
the  cameralist,  and  to  the  governments  of  the  quasi-absolutistic 
states,  a  plane  of  administrative  function  which  correlated 
individual  extractive  occupations  in  a  way  virtually  unknown 
in  America.  Our  Department  of  Agriculture,  our  Geological 
Survey,  our  irrigation  and  forestry  enterprises,  our  agricultural 
colleges  and  experiment  stations  are  recent  and  partial  approxi- 
mations to  certain  features  involved  in  the  German  system; 
but  they  rest  upon  a  quite  different  theory  of  the  relation  of 
the  state  to  individuals,  and  for  that  reason  are  essentially 
unlike  much  that  cameralistic  "rural  management"  included. 
On  the  other  hand,  this  phrase  did  not  include  the  special 
technique  of  extractive  industries.  Both  sides  of  this  fonnal 
description  of  the  concept  will  be  illustrated  by  details  in  the 
following  r^sum^. 

Sec.  30  begins  with  betrayal  of  the  complexity  of  the  classi- 
fication which  the  author  adopted.    He  says: 

Rural  management  is  regarded  in  Polizey  as  the  occupation  which 
provides  means  of  life;  in  its  commercial  functions  [Handlungsleis- 
tung]  as  also  providing  the  material  [Stofj]. 

It  is  added  at  once  that  the  phrase  is  used  to  include  the 
procuring  of  raw  material  from  all  three  realms  of  nature,  "the 
vegetable  kingdom,  the  animal  kingdom,  and  the  mineral 
kingdom."  Sonnenfels  proposes,  however,  to  deal  principally 
with  agricultural  management,  including  stock-raising,  in  so 
far  as  the  latter  is  combined  with  the  former;  and  "only 
in  the  political  aspect,  not  in  practical  technique,  which  it  is 
the  business  of  the  so-called  Oekonomie  to  treat."    The  stand- 


546  THE  CAMERALISTS 

point  from  which  tne  discussion  starts  is  further  indicated 
(§30  by  ^^6  specifications: 

"Considered  from  the  side  of  the  state,  the  perfection  of  rural 
management  consists  in  the  best  possible  utilization  of  the  earth' 
in  accordance  with  the  demands  of  subsistence  [Unterhalis]  and  of 
commerce."  A  note  adds:  "From  the  side  of  the  proprietor,  it 
is  the  best  combination  of  the  largest  yield  with  the  least  expenditure" 
[Vorauslage]. 

This  result  will  have  to  be  sought: 

I,  by  utilizing  all  the  earth;  II,  by  utilizing  it  in  the  best  way 
as  respects  systems  of  cultivation;  and  III,  by  utilizing  it  as  required 
by  relations  to  the  other  connected  or  def)endent  occupations.  The 
use  of  all  the  earth,  and  the  best  use  of  the  same,  coincide  in  many 
ways  in  obstacles  and  in  furtherance. 

Sec.  32  seems  to  start  upon  the  trail  of  a  cardinal  sociologi- 
cal distinction,  but  it  is  immediately  dropped,  and  nothing  is 
done  to  follow  out  the  fundamental  implications  of  the  distinc- 
tion.   The  first  sentence  reads: 

The  earth  is  either  private  property,  or  the  means  of  the  state.' 

The  dictum  follows  that: 

In  order  to  make  full  use  of  private  property,  the  proprietor  must 
have  first  the  necessary  power,  and  second  the  necessary  motives. 

« The  word  is  Erdreich.  We  might  of  course  render  it  "land," 
but  this  would  immediately  force  upon  it  an  interpretation  as  equivalent 
to  that  term  in  its  later  technical  sense.  Our  version  is  chosen  to  avoid 
that  anachronism  and  to  preserve  the  archaic  connotations  of  the  term. 

«  "  Das  Erdreich  ist  entweder  Privateigenthum  oder  Vermogen  des 
Staates."  This  juxtaposition  of  Eigenihum  and  Vermdgen  brings  out 
the  fact  previously  noted,  that  the  two  terms  are  sometimes  used  inter- 
changeably, and  sometimes  with  an  approach  to  respect  for  their  ety- 
mological distinctions.  The  result  is  uncritical  and  fallacious  German 
usage.  Translation  into  English  usually  makes  the  matter  worse.  It 
is  a  correct  general  proposition  that  at  this  period  the  class  of  writers  we 
are  dealing  with  were  unconcerned  about  precise  discrimination  between 
the  ethical,  the  legal,  and  the  merely  objective  material  connotations 
of  the  two  words. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  547 

Lack  of  means  for  rural  management  may  be  regarded  from  two 
sides  (^ss) ;  namely,  the  poverty  of  the  rural  folk  as  a  class,  or  of  the 
particular  cultivator.  The  former  condition  comes  from  such 
unavoidable  circumstances  as  first,  wars,  loss  of  cattle,  failure  of 
crops,  the  poverty  of  the  present  possessor,  or  only  from  his  tempo- 
rary embarrassment. 

Each  of  these  types  of  misfortune  is  treated  as  deserving  of  pub- 
lic attention.  Means  of  extinguishing  fires  are  to  be  provided  by 
the  local  administration;  the  dwellings  are  to  be  in  village  groups, 
not  scattered  over  the  land,  and  the  garden  plots  are  to  be  located 
between  the  houses  instead  of  behind  them,  the  bams  to  be  separated 
from  the  houses,  etc.,  in  order  that  there  may  be  the  minimum  dan- 
ger from  fire  with  the  maximum  facility  of  controlling  it.  Districts 
should  also  maintain  systems  of  mutual  fire  insurance;  proprietors 
should  be  made  to  see  that  their  interests  demand  such  precautions. 
In  case  such  protection  is  lacking,  the  cultivator  who  is  embarrassed 
must  be  assisted  either  by  the  proprietor  or  by  the  state.  Mere 
negative  help,  which  is  customary,  i.  e.,  remission  of  the  dues,  docs 
not  meet  the  case.  Active  help  must  be  given,  e.  g.,  lumber,  building 
materials,  farming  implements;  seed  must  be  furnished  gratuitously, 
or  at  least  on  the  easiest  terms.  If  the  individual  proprietors  are  not 
in  a  position  to  do  this,  it  must  be  done  by  the  state.  The  alternative 
is  sterilization  of  the  soil,  declining  value  of  the  revenues  of  the  state, 
and  diminishing  population.  To  remedy  these  conditions  is  more 
expensive  than  to  prevent  them.  The  direct  and  indirect  conse- 
quences of  cattle  diseases  are  among  the  important  objects  of  public 
attention.  To  prevent  them  veterinary  schools  should  be  introduced 
(§36),  and  the  causes  of  the  diseases  should  be  investigated.'  The 
price  of  salt,  and  provision  that  farmers  shall  have  easy  access  to 
it  are  important  in  this  connection,  and  should  be  carefully  looked 
to  by  the  state.  In  case  of  failure  of  crops,  as  in  case  of  fire  or  war, 
the  cultivator  must  be  helped  either  by  the  proprietor  or  the  state 
to  raise  his  crops  the  following  year.  The  state  must  take  measures 
to  prevent  exorbitant  or  oppressive  terms  in  case  of  loans  by  individ- 

»  A  note  states  that  the  so-called  Ecole  viUrinaire  was  opened  in 
Vienna  in  1766.  At  first  only  treatment  of  horses  was  attempted,  but 
attention  was  later  extended  to  all  species  of  farm  animals. 


548  THE  CAMERALISTS 

uals  (§37).  In  case  an  individual  proprietor  is  too  poor  properly  to 
cultivate  his  tract,  the  state  is  in  danger  of  suffering  loss  of  a  portion 
of  its  dues.  There  is  therefore  no  reason  why  the  state  should  not 
have  the  right  to  require  th^t  the  proprietor  should  permit  others 
to  cultivate  the  land  on  shares,  or  to  purchase  it.  The  very  circum- 
stances which  have  caused  the  embarrassment  of  the  proprietor  may 
make  such  purchaser  or  farmer  hard  to  find.  The  flocking  of  per- 
sons of  means  to  the  cities  leaves  the  cultivation  of  the  soil  to  an 
inferior  class  of  people.  In  case  forced  sale  is  necessary,  the  state 
should  provisiqnally  take  over  the  property  at  a  fair  price,  in  order 
that  the  possessor  may  not  be  comj)elled  to  make  too  great  sacrifice 
(§38).  Land  is  often  uncultivated,  not  by  reason  of  the  perma- 
nent but  the  temporary  poverty  of  the  possessor  (§39).  It  is  an 
unpardonable  mistake  of  the  law-making  power  to  aggravate  this 
helplessness  by  exaction  of  the  usual  dues.  The  proprietor  who 
has  allowed  the  tenant  to  fall  into  arrears  should  be  declared  to  have 
forfeited  the  amount. 

Laws  should  seek  to  prevent  excessive  debt  by  setting  a  limit  to 
the  amount  which  may  be  borrowed  (§40).  An  exception  should 
be  made  in  case  the  loan  is  necessary  for  actual  cultivation  of  the 
land,  and  the  conditions  of  loans  for  that  purpose  should  be  made 
especially  favorable,  and  should  be  under  the  oversight  of  the  proper 
officials. 

Unthrift  on  the  part  of  proprietors  will  be  checked  by  the  intro- 
duction of  supervisors  of  rural  management  [Landwirthschajtsauj- 
sichl]  ^§41),  consisting  of  the  of&cials  of  the  circuit  [Kreis]  to  whom 
a  subordinate  might  be  added,  and  the  private  managers  subordinated 
to  these.' 

A  second  means  of  preventing  neglect  of  proper  cultivation  is 
afforded  by  the  dues  to  the  state  (§42).  That  is,  every  piece  of 
arable  land  should  be  taxed  on  a  moderate  estimate  of  what 
it  would  yield  if  properly  cultivated.  Thus  the  occupant  will 
be  compelled  to  cultivate  the  land  or  to  pay  dues  for  land  which 
yields  him  no  crop,  while  the  industrious  cultivator  receives  as  it 

'  The  word  Oekonomieau/seher  is  used  later  in  the  section  apparently 
as  a  designation  for  the  ofHcials  constituted  supervisors  of  agricultural 
management. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNExNFELS  549 

were  a  reward  for  his  industry,  in  being  assessed  only  on  a  medium 
rate  of  yield. 

If  these  means  are  not  sufficient  to  secure  good  cultivation,  a 
third  remains.  It  seems  severe,  but  it  is  not  if  the  others  have  failed 
(§43),  viz. :  In  case  a  piece  of  land  has  remained  uncultivated  two  or 
three  years,  unless  the  proprietor  can  offer  to  the  supervisors  an  ade- 
quate excuse,  it  shall  be  declared  forfeited,  and  transferred  to  some- 
one who  will  cultivate  it.  Such  a  provision  is  based  on  the  claim 
which  the  state  has  upon  the  private  property  of  the  citizens,  for 
proportional  contribution  for  maintenance  of  the  whole.  The 
forfeiture  here  proposed  can  no  more  be  regarded  as  an  invasion  of 
property  rights  than  the  law  of  limitations.  The  security  of  property 
is  only  conditionally  assured  by  the  state,  viz.,  in  case  the  private 
proprietor  does  not  impair  the  property  of  the  state. 

The  lack  of  courage  on  the  part  of  the  cultivator  has  its  ground 
in  the  opinion  that  his  labor  is  lost,  and  that  he  will  not  reap  its  fruits 
(§44).  The  insecurity  of  property,  the  rate  of  taxation,  and  the 
excessively  favored  love  of  hunting,  on  the  part  both  of  the  sovereign 
prince  and  of  the  private  owners,  may  be  regarded  as  the  chief  causes 
of  this  lack  of  courage,  and  the  multitude  of  idle  days  may  be  added. 

In  case  the  insecurity  of  property  has  its  origin  in  the  defective 
fundamental  order  [Grundverfassung]  of  a  country,  it  will  always 
be  difficult  for  the  laws  to  limit  the  evil  (§45).'  If  the  private  posses- 
sors considered,  however,  that  such  fundamental  order  made  against 
their  own  advantage,  they  would  not  oppose  abrogation  of  the  same. 
The  right  which  is  based  on  ancient  possession  is  made  very  question- 
able through  the  older  and  imprescriptible  rights  of  mankind.* 
Where  the  tenants  in  a  certain  sense  are  regarded  only  as  farmers 

1  The  term  Grundverfassung,  in  the  idiom  of  this  period,  had  the 
effect  of  a  pun.  It  seems  to  have  carried  partially  a  literal  and  par- 
tially a  derived  meaning.  That  is,  the  concept  in  the  author's  mind 
seems  to  have  been  a  blur  of  the  two  notions,  land  tenure  and  constitution 
in  something  approaching  the  modern  sense. 

•  This  is  the  passage  cited  by  Roscher  in  support  of  the  proposition: 
"It  is  characteristic  of  Sonnenfels'  absolutism  to  be  more  liberal  at  the 
expense  of  private  rights  than  at  the  expense  of  governmental  power." 
Vide  above,  p.  485.     Roscher's  point  appears  to  be  well  taken. 


550  THE  CAMERALISTS 

[Paclilinliaber]  the  lords  of  the  soil  think  they  do  wisely  when  they 
transfer  a  thrifty  farmer  to  the  holdings  of  a  negligent  one.  Instead 
of  increasing  the  industry  of  each,  they  ruin  both.  The  negligent 
one  shirks  work  because  he  is  negligent,  because  this  negligence  is 
rewarded,  and  he  keeps  hoping  for  the  same  reason  to  be  transferred 
to  a  better  cultivated  location.  The  thrifty  one  is  discouraged  and 
refuses  to  make  improvements  which  would  give  occasion  for  another 
transfer.  Since  this  right  has  such  great  influence  upon  the  condition 
of  rural  management  in  general,  we  cannot  but  approve  a  system 
which  would  assure  to  the  peasants  a  tenure  for  life  at  least,  and 
the  abolition  of  this  freedom  of  transfer.' 

The  evictions  [Abstijtungen]  which  the  officials  are  sometimes 
emiwwercd  to  make  must  also  be  reckoned  as  unfavorable  to  the 
security  of  property  (§§45,  46).  They  must  consequently  never  be  a 
one-sided  procedure.  Even  the  economic  supervisors  must  have 
their  hands  bound  in  this  respect;  how  much  more  the  private 
owners. 

The  tiller  of  the  soil  will  work  only  hard  enough  to  maintain 
life,  if  all  the  rest  of  his  produce  is  taken  from  him  by  landlord  and 
government  (§47).  Experience  proves  how  little  statesmanship 
there  is  in  the  proposition,  "The  peasant  is  most  industrious  when 
he  is  miserable." 

Sees.  48  and  49  recite  some  of  the  hardships  which  hunting  rights 
inflict  on  cultivators  of  the  soil,  and  point  out  the  depressing  effect 
of  these  hardships  upon  cultivation  in  general.  The  author  observes 
that  the  restrictions  which  the  laws  ostensibly  put  on  these  rights  arc 
always  ineffective  in  practice.  The  indemnities  allowed  to  the  farm- 
ers are  awarded  by  the  parties  who  inflict  the  losses,  and  conse- 
quently do  not  compensate  the  loser,  while  it  is  impossible  to  repair 

'  A  note  (p.  55)  sf>caks  of  "Die  okon.  Gesellschafl  zu  Petersburg." 
The  note  continues:  "The  organization  in  1765  offered  a  prize  on  this 
subject:  'Is  it  to  the  advantage  of  the  state  that  the  peasants  should 
jxjssess  property  ?  Docs  this  question  do  credit  to  a  government  ?  to 
our  century  ?  to  mankind  ? '  The  better  solutions  are  the  monograph 
which  received  the  prize,  under  the  title,  La  FelicilS  puhlique  and  another 
by  Ucardc  de  i'Abbayc.  Meritorious  also  were  those  of  Woclnor,  Mark, 
Ocdcr,  and  Merkel." 


CAMERALISTICS  01-  SONNKNFELS  551 

the  damage  done  to  the  national  productiveness  in  general.  The 
time  and  loss  of  rest  expended  on  protecting  crops  against  game 
are  a  great  drain  on  the  resources  of  the  country.  An  ordinance  of 
Joseph  II,  dated  January,  1786,  is  called  a  long-overdue  attempt 
to  protect  the  general  welfare  of  many  against  a  very  equivocal 
pleasure  of  the  few. 

The  depressing  influence  of  fast  days  and  other  holidays  upon 
agriculture  is  referred  to  again  in  §49,  and  complaint  is  made  that 
"the  obstinacy  or  the  caprice  of  the  pastor"  determines  whether  the 
peasants  shall  be  permitted  to  take  advantage  of  good  weather  on  such 
a  day,  after  protracted  rain,  to  make  sure  of  the  crop  for  which  they 
have  toiled  earlier  in  the  season.  While  Sonnenfels  here  betrays 
independence  of  ecclesiastical  tradition,  yet  one  detects  in  his  tone 
no  such  bitterness  toward  the  clergy  as  is  frequently  exhibited  by 
Justi. 

In  §50  the  author  verges  upon  economic  generalization  in  the 
Sniithian  sense.  Thus  he  says:  "The  more  incentives  to  labor 
are  presented  to  the  farmer,  the  greater  will  be  his  diligence.  The 
first  motive  for  him  is  the  support  of  self  and  family;  the  second,  the 
tribute  [Entrichtung]  to  which  he  is  bound;  the  third,  the  desire 
to  lay  by  something  in  case  of  need,  for  the  improvement  of  his  con- 
dition, or  for  his  family.  The  products  of  the  soil  must  not  fall  below 
a  value  which  affords  the  hope  that  all  three  motives  may  be  satisfied. 
In  determining  this  price  the  interests  of  agriculture  seem  to  be 
to  a  certain  extent  opposed  to  those  of  other  kinds  of  business  [Hand- 
lungsgeschUfte].  If  the  price  of  agricultural  products  is  high,  the 
price  of  every  manufactured  product  must  rise,  whereby  one  of  the 
principal  qualities  of  a  ware,  cheapness,  is  lost.  If  the  price  of  agri- 
cultural products  is  low,  it  is  not  suflSciently  encouraging  for  the 
farmer,  and  he  finds  it  to  his  advantage  to  produce'  less,  because  from 
half  the  crop  He  can  then  receive  a  like  sum,  and  save  himself  trouble, 
time,  seed,  etc.  Only  the  medium  price  remains  therefore  where 
the  interests  of  both  branches  can  be  combined.  This  medium  price 
may  be  considered  in  its  essence  or  merely  numerically." 

The  subject  is  continued  in  §51:  "In  its  essence  the  medium 
price  is  always  and  everywhere  the  same:  the  price,  namely,  which 
»  Erzielen;  vide  above,  pp.  532  and  534. 


552  THE  CAMERALISTS 

stands  in  such  relation  to  the  condition  of  commerce  in  general'  that 
thereby  land  management  may  get  its  proportional  share  of  the  gain 
which  comes  from  commerce.  This  sharing  in  the  general  advan- 
tage is  not  only  just,  it  is  also  necessary.  The  state  is  under  obliga- 
tions to  observe  and  maintain  equality  between  the  members  of  society 
according  to  the  degree  of  their  reciprocal  contribution  to  the  general 
welfare.  Where  this  equality  is  not  observed  the  neglected  part 
lacks  those  encouragements  which  must  be  the  spur  to  and  the  real 
soul  of  diligence.  It  is  also  unavoidably  demanded  in  order  that 
the  worth  of  the  agricultural  products  may  procure  for  the  seller 
adequate  means  of  satisfying  his  other  wants,  that — in  the  degree 
in  which  the  wants  either  rise  in  price,  or  otherwise,  as  through  the 
prosperity  of  commerce,  the  prosperity  of  the  working  class,  and 
with  the  same  the  number  of  their  wants  increases — the  farmer  shall 
find  enough  in  the  price  of  his  products  to  procure  either  the  higher- 
priced  or  the  more  numerous  wants.  If  his  way"  to  this  result  is 
closed  by  an  arbitrary  fixing  of  the  price,  it  would  follow  in  the  one 
case  that  his  wants  would  not  be  satisfied,  whereby  he  would  be  forced 
to  interrupt  his  labor;  or,  in  the  other  case,  his  condition  would  be 
at  least  relatively  more  unfortunate  than  that  of  the  other  working 
classes.  The  peasant  class  would  consequently  be  abandoned, 
because  it  would  be  eager  to  improve  its  lot  by  going  over  to  the  other 
classes.  Those  that  would  remain  in  the  class  would  be  without 
means,  or  would  avenge  themselves  by  indolence  for  the  unrighteous- 
ness of  society." 

The  conclusion  is  drawn  in  §52:  "It  is  consequently  necessary 
from  so  many  grounds  to  assure  to  land  management  through  the 
medium  price  its  share  of  the  gains  of  commerce.  But  the  regulation 
of  the  medium  price  cannot  occur  through  the  taxes,  but  through 
the  reciprocal  agreements  of  purchasers  and  sellers  in  the  market 
place,  if  no  hindrances  are  otherwise  placed  in  the  way  of  the  free- 
dom of  these  compacts.'  If  the  varying  market  price  of  several 
ordinary  years  is  compared,  and  the  average  reckoned,  this  will  be 

'  The  word  is  Handlung,  and  with  the  variation  noted  in  J 50  it 
illustrates  the  lack  of  uniformity  in  usage  throughout  the  book. 

*  A  note  cites  as  such  hindrance  the  ancient  right  of  the  lord  to  an 
option  on  the  produce  before  it  is  taken  to  market. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  553 

taken  as  the  numerical  mean,  which  is  variable  according  to  circum- 
stances." 

Still  further,  in  §53,  Sonnenfels  has  an  elementary  statement  of 
the  demand  side  of  price,  with  the  corollary  that  "the  state  must  see 
that  the  number  of  sellers  is  not  too  great,  and  also  that  a  proportional 
number  of  customers  for  agricultural  products  may  be  assured." 
In  §54  natural  variations  of  demand  and  supply  are  further  discussed 
in  contrast  with  forced  variations,  e.  g.,  through  constraint  upon  the 
peasants  to  pay  their  taxes"  at  a  certain  time.  The  closer  this  date 
is  to  the  harvest  the  greater  the  disadvantage  to  the  farmer.  The 
cheapness  of  farm  products  at  such  a  time  is  one  of  the  principal 
causes  of  the  ruin  of  agriculture.  "The  state  has  therefore  not 
merely  to  moderate  the  fiscal  burdens  upon  agriculture,  but  to  pre- 
vent cheapening  of  the  produce  by  spreading  the  payment  over 
various  periods."' 

The  sections  just  epitomized  (§§50-54)  are  notable  for 
several  reasons.  In  the  first  place,  they  prf  sent  the  familiar 
conception  of  the  state  as  a  something  which  is  set  over  against 
the  component  elements  of  the  nation.  In  the  second  place, 
they  consistently  presume  that  the  state  can  and  must  regulate 
prices.  In  the  third  place,  they  show  that  some  of  the  elemen- 
tary facts  of  market  valuation,  which  eventually  show  the 
impotence  of  statute  law  against  economic  law,  were  beginning 
to  make  an  impression.  Sonnenfels  does  not  go  very  far 
toward  drawing  the  involved  conclusions,  but  the  difference 
between  him  and  Justi  in  this  connection  is  not  so  much  in 
variations  of  view  about  particulars,  as  in  the  extent  to  which 
Sonnenfels  betrays  a  sort  of  premonition  that  something  deeper 
than  laws  of  the  state  is  the  key  to  the  situation. 

Sec.  55  analyzes  demand  into  that  of  national  and  that  of  foreign 
consumers.  As  to  the  former^  it  is  not  enough  that  there  should  be. 
a  favorable  proportion  between  agricultural  products  and  consum- 
ers, i.  e.,  a  large  population;   it  is  at  the  same  time  necessary  that 

I  A  note  names  Michaelmas  (September  29)  as  the  time  shown 
by  experietice  to  be  fairest  for  the  payment  of  agricultural  taxes. 


554  THE  CAMERALISTS 

this  population  shall  be  distributed  so  that  local  demand  and  supply 
shall  be  balanced.  Otherwise  the  purchasers  will  control  prices 
at  one  point,  and  sellers  at  another.  The  former  situation  tends  to 
ruin  agriculture.  Hence  disproportionate  flocking  of  people  to 
chief  cities  is  the  main  cause  of  the  decline  of  agriculture  (§56). 
Those  states  therefore  are  most  prosperous  in  this  respect  which 
have  numerous  provincial  cities  in  which  the  landed  gentry  reside. 
Here  manufactures  will  also  spring  up,  and  become  middle  points 
of  consumption,  through  which  money  will  circulate  uniformly  in 
all  localities.  If  these  intermediate  cities  did  not  exist,  this  division 
of  consumers  might  be  otherwise  secured,  e.  g.,  by  forbidding  the 
nobility  not  in  the  service  of  the  government  permanently  to  leave 
their  estates,  and  by  distributing  over  the  country  those  consumers 
that  are  not  necessarily  located  in  the  capital,  e.  g.,  factories,  alms- 
houses, universities,  a  great  number  of  cloisters,  etc.  From  the 
same  point  of  view  §57  discusses  the  operation  of  intermediate  tariffs 
between  provinces  of  the  same  state;  the  inference  is  that  both 
agriculture  and  the  state  suffer  if  artificial  barriers  limit  the  extent 
of  the  market. 

But  the  demand  of  national  consumers  cannot,  at  the  present 
rate  of  population,  assure  to  agriculture  the  price  necessary  for  its 
encouragement  (§58).'  Hope  of  foreign  markets  alone  can  stimu- 
late the  farmer  to  cultivate  all  his  land,  and  give  him  courage  for 
better  cultivation.  This  hope  will  be  animated  by  freedom  of  export. 
"Opinions  about  the  advantage  of  free  trade  in  grain,  and  about 
the  limits  of  the  freedom,  have  varied  among  times,  states,  and  writers 
(§59).  Early  times  did  not  consider  agriculture  in  connection  with 
commerce,  and  fear  of  scarcity  long  restricted  export  of  grain.  On 
the  contrary,  writers  of  eminence  have  urged  unlimited  freedom  in 
this  respect  at  all  times  and  places.  The  purpose  and  the  effect  of 
free  export  of  grain  must  be  to  assure  a  sufficiently  remunerative 
price  for  agricultural  products  without  embarrassing  national  con- 
sumption. This  combination  is  secured  in  a  freedom  of  export 
which  is  not  directly  limited  in  quantity  but  by  rise  of  price  above 
'  The  number  that  the  land  could  support  per  square  mile  (German) 
is  estimated  by  Sonnenfels  as  1,500;  this  after  comparison  with  Siiss- 
milch's  estimate  of  2,750,  and  Vauban's  of  2,361. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  555 

an  accepted  mean.  In  application  this  principle  will  have  the  expres- 
sion: Everyone  has  freedom  to  export  grain  so  long  as  the  price  at 
such  and  sttch  markets  does  not  exceed  such  and  such  figures."^ 

"If  administrative  policy  adopts  this  view,  it  rests  on  the  prin- 
ciple that  the  mean  price  is  a  sign  of  adequate  supply  [Feilschaft] 
(§60).  If  this  is  not  the  case  the  state  is  infallibly  and  immediately 
informed  of  it  by  the  advancing  price.  At  the  same  time  the  counter- 
influence  begins  to  work.  Export  ceases,  and  the  national  market 
contains  what  had  been  exported.  Theredpon  the  price  falls.  The 
mean  price  and  therewith  freedom  of  export  are  restored. 

"England  began  in  1689  to  furnish  the  other  nations  an  illus- 
tration that  freedom  of  foreign  trade  in  grain  not  only  supports  the 
cultivator  in  this  industry,  but  is  also  capable  of  bringing  agriculture 
to  perfection  (§61).  Since  that  time  other  nations  have  tried  still 
harder  to  promote  agriculture,  and  through  this  effort  foreign  trade 
in  grain  has  been  greatly  hindered.  All  the  more  must  the  law-giver 
remove  the  internal  hindrances  and  must  assist  the  merchants  by 
external  means,  e.  g.,  premiums  on  export,  etc.,  so  that  they  can 
compete  with  the  merchants  of  other  nations." 

These  sections  have  been  reviewed  at  such  length  because 
they  contain  a  neglected  link  in  the  chain  of  evidence  which 
accounts  for  the  tendencies  in  political  theory,  both  abstract 
and  technological,  for  the  following  half-century.  The 
remainder  of  the  chapter  is  of  minor  importance  for  our  chief 
purpose.  If  affords  cumulative  evidence,  however,  of  the 
minuteness  with  which  cameralism  analyzed  elements  of 
national  prudence. 

The  immediately  following  sections  (§§62,  63)  refer  to  the  prob- 
lems of  utilizing  lands  that  for  various  reasons  arc  wholly  or  partially 
uncultivated.  Sees.  64-79  develop  the  same  problem  in  connection 
with  such  details  as  means  of  assuring  a  proper  proportion  between 
cultivators  of  the  soil  and  other  classes;  discouragement  of  luxury; 
restriction  of  the  numbers  of  the  servant  class;    the  loss  of  labor 

*A  note  begins  with  the  words:  "Die  Oekonomisten,  ein  Zweig 
der  Encyklopedisten,  fodern  eine  unter  alien  Umstilnden  freye  Ausfuhr." 
The  same  use  of  the  term  Oekenomisten  occurs  in  a  note  to  56i. 


556  THE  CAMERALISTS 

through  military  service;  colonization  of  laborers;  means  of  making 
new  settlements  prosperous;  reclamation  of  waste  lands  through 
clearing  of  forests,  the  draining  of  swamps,  the  construction  of  dykes 
and  protection  of  the  same.  Sees.  80-107  elaborate  the  following 
proposition:  "In  order  that  the  earth  may  be  used  to  the  best  pur- 
pose in  respect  to  cultivation,  it  is  necessary:  7,  that  the  rural  folk 
shall  possess  the  necessary  knowledge  0}  cultivation  and  of  agricul- 
tural improvements;  11,  that  no  hindrances  shall  stand  in  the  way 
of  applying  their  knowledge;  III,  land  which  is  devoted  to  other 
purposes  than  cultivation  must  be  managed  with  skill." ^ 

The  center  of  attention  under  the  first  clause  is  the  introduction 
and  development  of  various  sorts  of  agricultural  schools,  and  means 
of  scattering  the  information  gathered  by  such  schools  among  the 
peasantry.' 

The  second  clause  deals  chiefly  with  hardships  that  come 
from  the  methods  of  concentrating  or  dividing  the  land,  from 
the  taxing  system,  or  from  survivals  of  feudal  liabilities.  On 
the  first  subject  it  is  asserted  that  "the  French  economists  are 
in  general  in  favor  of  cultivation  on  a  large  scale,  and  assume 

'  In  this  part  of  the  book  the  following  are  referred  to:  "Wiegand, 
der  Verfasser  des  verniinftigen  Landwirlhs;"  no  further  clue  is  given; 
"Young,  Politische  Arithmetik;"  Ingram,  in  Enc.  Brit.,  title  "Arthur 
Young,"  says:  ".  .  .  .  in  j-jj 4  his  Political  Arithmetic,  ....  was  soon 
translated  into  several  foreign  languages."  Other  references  are: 
Nickols,  Avant  el  DefavatU,  de  la  France,  etc.,  ^dit  nouvelle  d'Amst.; 
Principes  de  la  legislation  universelle,  author  not  named,  but  cited  as  repre- 
senting "die  franzosischen  Oekonomisten;"  Arbulhnot,  Sur  ViUiliti  des 
grandes  Fermes  el  des  riches  Fermiers,  traduit  par  Freville;  Trait6  poli- 
tiqtte  et  oeconomique  sur  les  communes,  ou  observation  sur  I' agriculture,  sur 
I'origiru,  la  destination  et  Vital  actuel  des  biens  et  communes,  etc.;  Getting, 
Prcisschrift  in  dem  hanoverischen  Magazin,  p.  764;  Peningthon,  Rffie- 
xions  sur  les  avantages  qui  resultent  du  portage  des  communes  pour  Hre 
diifraichis  et  mis  en  clos;  Schlettwein  in  dem  hanov.  Magazin,  704. 

9  For  instance,  "An  ordinance  of  the  Austrian  states,  to  the  effect 
that  the  calendars  for  the  common  people  should  not  be  printed,  without 
previous  approval  of  the  oconomischen  Gesellschaften.  These  societies 
are  considered  among  the  most  important  of  these  educational  agencies. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  557 

as  certain  that  it  is  not  possible  to  cultivate  small  holdings 
profitably"  (p.  128).  In  the  same  connection  Arbuthnot  is 
cited  as  representing  English  opinion  to  the  same  effect.  The 
third  clause  is  devoted  to  three  classes  of  uses  of  the  land  by 
which  agriculture  is  the  loser:  meadows,  common  pastures, 
and  tracts  reserved  for  beauty. 

Chap,  ii,  on  manufactures,  begins  with  the  definition: 
"Manufactures,  in  the  most  extended  and  literal  sense,  are 
all  occupations  which  give  a  new  form  to  any  stuff  whatsoever." 
Millers,  bakers,  and  all  similar  workers  are  expressly  included 
in  the  class  of  manufaturers.  More  specifically,  manufac- 
turers are  those  species  of  artisans  who  make  a  stock,  or  so- 
called  merchants'  goods.'     In  the  more  proj^er  sense, 

Manufacture  is  the  correlation  of  all  the  kinds  of  labor  which 
are  demanded  in  order  to  make  a  ware  complete,  that  is,  to  make 
it  marketable.  The  manufacturer  is  accordingly  the  citizen  who 
guides  this  correlation. 

The  purpose  of  manufactures,  from  the  standpoint  of  the  indi- 
vidual manufacturer,  is  to  provide  support  and  gain;  from  the  stand- 
point of  the  whole  state,  to  increase  the  occupations;  in  other  words, 
through  manufactures  to  give  work  and  employment  to  a  part  of  the 
people  which  land  management  does  not  employ. 

The  paragraph  continues: 

From  this  point  of  view,  from  which  manufactures  must  be 
contemplated  by  the  public  administration,  the  designation  by  which 
the  economists'  mean  to  depreciate  the  value  of  artisanship  and  of 
the  whole  class  of  manufacturers,  is  a  senseless  play  on  words.  The 
amount  advanced  to  manufactures  is  called  by  them  "an  unproduc- 

'  Welche  Verlag  oder  xogenanntes  Kaufmannsgut  machen. 

»  The  context  brings  out  most  clearly  the  shade  of  meaning  which 
Sonnenfels  associated  with  this  particular  use  of  the  term  Oekonomisten; 
that  is,  it  was  pretty  nearly  coextensive  with  the  class  Physiocrat  and 
it  did  not  mean,  as  it  did  later,  "one  who  is  studying  problems  relating 
to  wealth."  It  meant  "one  who  adheres  to  the  peculiar  theory  about 
sources  of  wealth  advocated  by  the  physiocrats." 


SS^  THE  CAMERALISTS 

tive  outlay"  [unfruchtbare  Auslage];  the  class  of  manufacturers,  "the 
unproductive  class,"  because,  in  the  physical  sense  of  the  word, 
they  do  not  create  [hervorbfingen]  anything.  The  essential  thing 
is,  however,  not  whether  manufactures  create,  but,  whether  they 
enlarge  occupation,  that  is,  whether  they  increase  the  means  of  sup- 
port for  the  people,  and  herewith  the  population,  the  welfare  of  the 
state  from  within,  the  security  and  prestige  of  the  same  from  without. 
This  is  the  effect  of  manufactures.  They  themselves  really  originate 
[erzielen]  nothing;  they  are  however  the  immediate  occasion  for 
the  origination  of  the  stuff,  which  without  the  transformation  of 
artisanship  would  have  no  worth  and  consequently  would  not  be 
originated. 

A  note  illustrates  the  author's  meaning  by  the  specification: 

"Without  the  prospect  of  linen,  flax  would  have  little  or  no  use. 
Worked  into  Brabantian  lace  the  price  rises  to  such  an  extent  that 
the  worth  of  the  stuff  entirely  disappears."  The  text  continues: 
Manufacturers  "are  the  immediate  occasion  for  the  enlargement 
of  agriculture,  for  they  increase  the  consumption  of  the  necessities 
of  life,  which  would  otherwise  be  reduced  to  the  demands  of  the  culti- 
vating families,  and  consequently  would  be  without  value.  They 
even  occasion  a  real  growth  of  national  wealth.  For,  although, 
according  to  the  calculation  of  the  physiocrats,  in  the  case  of  an  arti- 
ficial product  all  parts  of  the  investment  [Vorauslage]  can  be  resolved 
into  products  of  the  soil  [Erdreich],  yet  in  the  case  of  wares  disposed 
of  abroad  the  gain  of  the  merchant  cannot  be  classified  under  that 
head,  but  is  a  real  addition  either  in  equivalents  of  wealth  [Nutnera- 
Hen]  or  in  wares  taken  in  exchange.*  More  than  that,  when  the 
Genevan  clock-maker  constructs  of  brass  and  steel  worth  perhaps 
two  gulden  a  clock  which  he  sells  abroad  for  thirty  gulden,  and  then 
in  exchange  for  the  thirty  gulden  imports  fifteen  measures  of  grain, 
is  not  his  skilled  labor  quite  as  fruit-bringing  for  Geneva  as  that  of 
a  farmer  who  has  got  fifteen  measures  from  his  field  ?  On  the  other 
hand,  when  a  state  raises  a  surplus  of  agricultural  products,  but  is 

'  A  note  adds  the  illustration:  "A  bale  of  cloth  stands  the  merchant 
in  the  marketplace  of  Sinigaglia  1,500.  He  sells  it  for  2,000.  The  gain 
of  500  is  increase  of  the  mass." 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  559 

surrounded  by  states  that  are  devoted  to  agriculture,  its  surplus 
will  find  no  sale,  and  because  there  is  no  prospect  of  disposing  of  it 
no  surplus  will  be  raised.  But  a  silk  factory  is  established.  The 
laborers  engaged  in  it  consume  the  produce  of  the  field.  The  silks 
are  exported.  The  state  receives  in  exchange  their  worth.  Is 
it  not  indifferent  to  the  state  whether  it  exports  grain  in  its  original 
form,  or  grain  transformed  into  silk  ?  Only,  that  the  skilled  labor 
obtained  a  sale  which  agriculture  could  not  have  obtained;  only, 
that  the  skilled  labor  furnishes  a  growth  in  occupation  and  so  a  growth 
in  population." 

Sec.  no  draws  the  conclusion,  which  serves  as  the  presump- 
tion of  the  rest  of  the  book: 

Manufactures  are  thus,  in  the  economy  of  the  state,  not  unfruit- 
ful, but  a  useful  and  an  indispensable  enlargement  of  occupation.  In 
the  arranging  [Anordnung]  of  manufactures  the  grades  of  promotion 
are  to  be  measured  according  to  their  contribution  to  the  purpose 
of  the  state,  that  is,  according  as  the  general  mass  of  occupation  is 
enlarged  and  made  more  permanent.  The  general  mass  of  occupa- 
tion, however,  gains  only  when  artisan  labor  is  a  means  of  multiply- 
ing the  products  of  agriculture.'  Those  manufactures  accordingly 
deserve  the  first  attention  for  which  national  stuff  is  either  actually 
in  hand,  or  might  be  had  with  little  trouble.  Without  observing  this 
consideration,  agriculture  not  only  loses  a  possible  sale,  and  conse- 
quently a  portion  of  the  occupation  which  it  could  appropriate;  but 
the  manufacturing  labor  will  be  dependent  upon  those  nations  which 
furnish  the  raw  stuff.  Therefore  the  occupation  of  the  people,  from 
this  side  also,  will  exist  only  by  favor  [bittweise],  that  is,  only  so  long 

'  A  note  expands  the  argument  in  this  way:  "The  harm  which  may 
come  to  a  nation  in  the  various  branches  of  its  welfare  is  affirmative  or 
negative.  The  affirmative  is  diminution  of  the  greatness  which  it  pos- 
sesses: if,  for  example,  one  thousand  of  the  citizens  emigrate,  or  a  half- 
million  capital  flows  out  without  compensation.  The  negative  is  failure 
to  realize  the  growth  which  is  within  the  power  of  the  nation:  if,  for 
example,  the  foreign  trade  is  conducted  with  foreign  carriage,  whereby 
the  nation  loses  the  cost  of  carriage  in  the  selling  price.  In  the  calcula- 
tion of  political  commerce,  gains  not  made  are  entered  on  the  debit  side. 
That  is,  what  might  have  been  gained  and  was  not  is  reckoned  as  a  loss." 


560  THE  CAMERALISTS 

as  the  nation  from  which  the  raw  stuff  is  received  either  does  not 
work  it  up  itself,  or  it  is  not  taken  under  more  favorable  conditions 
by  another  nation,  or  for  some  reason  or  other  the  supplying  nation 
makes  the  export  of  the  stuff  more  difficult,  or  finally  for  political 
reasons  the  supplying  nation  stops  production  of  this  stuff  altogether. 

Continuing  the  argument,  §111  proceeds: 

It  is  worth  while  to  draw  out  the  consequences  of  such  a  situation 
still  farther,  in  order  to  reach  conviction  of  another  truth,  viz.:  that 
it  is  less  harmful  never  to  have  extended  occupations  above  a  medium 
number,  than  ultimately  to  lose  something  from  a  greater  number. 
In  the  former  case,  to  be  sure,  the  state  will  enjoy  only  a  moderate 
degree  of  prosperity,  but  it  will  maintain  itself  on  that  level.  In 
the  other  case  the  reversal  of  its  prosjjerity  will  be  almost  without 
limits.  In  such  circumstances  many  people  lose  their  occupation. 
That  is,  they  no  longer  receive  the  sum  of  money  which  they  pre- 
viously used  for  their  support.  Since  it  is  not  easy  at  once  to  absorb 
an  unemployed  number  into  the  ranks  of  the  general  gainful  agen- 
cies, the  laborers  who  have  lost  their  employment  will  be  reduced 
to  the  most  miserable  circumstances,  and  p^erhaps  find  themselves 
compelled  to  emigrate  in  order  to  find  ways  of  earning  a  living.  I 
will  not  follow  out  the  consequences  of  diminution  of  the  number 
of  marriages  and  other  harmful  accompanying  effects,  but  restrict 
myself  to  the  most  immediate. 

The  section  closes  with  a  brief  but  clear  indication  of  the 
different  effects  of  a  contraction  of  the  market  through  with- 
drawal of  the  purchasing  power  of  the  unemployed. 

It  would  he  difficult  to  epitomize  the  remainder  of  the  chap- 
ter, and  a  very  general  description  must  suffice.  It  must  be 
said  with  emphasis  that  this  chapter  would  repay  study  today. 
The  men  who  arc  engaged  in  callings  which  apply  this  sort  of 
knowledge  usually  prefer  to  get  their  information  by  doing 
the  thing  itself,  rather  than  by  consulting  books.  The  men  who 
are  resi)onsil)le  for  the  parliamentary  process  of  enacting  public 
demands  into  law  do  not  as  a  rule  in  this  country  attain  emi- 
nence as  students  of  comparative  legislation.   The  programmes 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  561 

of  more  than  a  century  ago  do  not  appear  to  impress  them  as 
likely  to  throw  light  on  the  problems  of  modern  life.  The 
fact  is  that  democracy  has  yet  to  learn  how  to  co-operate  as 
effectively  on  the  basis  of  its  fundamental  conceptions,  as 
quasi-absolutism  did  on  the  basis  which  democrats  repudiate. 
The  German  benevolent  despotisms  of  the  eighteenth  century 
took  a  more  comprehensive  survey  of  the  different  factors 
which  must  lay  the  foundation  of  general  prosperity  than 
American  democracy  has  learned  to  take.  These  benevolent 
despotisms  accordingly  planned  more  intelligent  co-operation 
of  their  interests  and  agencies  than  Americans  have  yet  devised. 
The  German  system  wasted  at  the  governmental  end,  on  the 
expenditures  of  the  court,  and  on  the  military  system,  much 
that  this  prudent  thrift  at  the  popular  end  enabled  states  to 
save.  On  the  other  hand,  we  lose  in  actual  convenience,  com- 
fort, and  security  of  life  much  that  the  German  paternalistic 
system  secured.  Without  surrendering  any  principle  of 
democratic  political  philosophy  whatsoever,  Americans  may 
well  study  the  details  of  German  quasi-absolutistic  adminis- 
tration, in  order  to  learn  from  it  elements  of  public  and  private 
prudence  which  our  pride  of  individualism  has  caused  us  to 
neglect,  and  greatly  to  our  own  hurt. 

The  remainder  of  the  chapter  elaborates  an  analysis  along 
these  lines: 

A  manufacture  occupies  more  people  in  proportion  to  the  amount 
of  preparation  necessary  before  the  stuff  which  it  handles  becomes 
complete  wares,  and  in  proportion  to  the  generality  of  its  use  (§iia). 
The  more  common  use  of  a  ware  depends  upon  its  sale  to  the  greater 
part  of  the  people;  that  is,  it  must  be  of  a  quality  and  price  which 
the  small  means  of  the  great  numbers  can  purchase  (§113).  It 
would  be  at  bottom  to  the  advantage  of  manufacturers  to  give  to  their 
wares  the  four  features:  cheap  price,  good  quality,  external  beauty, 
and  variety.  Shortsighted  manufacturers  should  be  compelled 
to  recognize  this  principle,  so  that  they  would  not  in  the  end  make 


562  THE  CAMERALISTS 

foreign  purchases  more  desirable,  and  thus  diminish  the  amount  of 
home  occupation  (§114).  In  order  to  be  able  to  sell  wares  of  a  poor 
quality  at  a  high  price,  the  manufacturer  must  be  in  a  position  to 
control  the  supply,  and  it  must  be  something  that  the  public  needs. 
If  competitors  enter  into  rivalry,  the  conditions  are  reversed.  The 
conjunction  of  the  above  conditions  alone  can  insure  to  manufac- 
tured articles  those  qualities  which  will  multiply  their  sale  (§115). 
So  soon  as  an  occupation  yields  profits,  it  is  attractive  enough  for 
itself;  hence,  to  promote  the  active  combination  of  factors  above 
named,  not  only  affirmative  means  are  necessary,  but  also  negative, 
i.  e.,  removal  of  all  hindrances  to  industry  and  zeal,  e.  g.,  monopolies, 
exclusive  societies,  special  privileges,  manufactures  supported  by 
the  prince,  exclusive  guilds,  and  disproportionate  levies  upon  a 
manufacture.  Examination  of  these  hindrances  in  order  will  call 
attention  to  principles  which  may  never  be  neglected  in  conducting 
manufactures  (§§116-32).' 

Throughout  this  discussion  the  word  Zusammenfluss  defies 
translation.  Collating  all  the  passages  in  which  it  occurs 
one  would  decide  that  the  concept  which  the  author  generally 
associated  with  it  was  "concurrence  of  all  the  conditions  neces- 
sary to  insure  the  four  qualities  of  manufactured  goods 
enumerated  above."  In  certain  cases  it  is  plainly  used  in  the 
sense  of  "concourse,"  either  of  buyers,  or  sellers,  or  laborers, 
or  capitalists,  as  the  case  may  he.  In  other  passages  it  means 
"aj^reement  between  competitors;"  in  others  it  apparently 
puts  the  emphasis  on  the  competition  itself;  while  again  the 

'  While  containing  no  distinctly  new  view,  these  sections  show  decided 
advance  in  maturity  over  Becher's  treatment  of  Monopolium  and  Propo- 
lium.  Vide  above,  pp.  128  ff.  Sonnenfels'  major  premise  throughout  the 
discussion  is  that  the  maximum  powers  of  the  state  are  not  developed 
unless  the  conditions  are  maintained  in  which  goods  are  manufactured 
within  the  nation  in  conformity  with  the  four  specifications.  A  very 
fair  anticipation  of  the  modern  argument  against  governmental  conduct 
of  industry  appears  in  §§126  ff.  In  §130  the  reference  occurs:  "  Sur  les 
compagnics  et  les  maitrises  traduit  de  I'Anglois.  Chinki  histoire 
Chochin  chinoise,  p.  Coyer." 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  563 

chief  reference  seems  to  be  to  the  idea  of  a  confluence  of  manu- 
facturing enterprise  into  channels  that  would  provide  a  suffi- 
cient supply  of  goods.  Sonnenfels  apparently  regards  the  word 
as  a  sort  of  technical  term,  but  it  is  not  confined  to  a  precise 
idea. 

Passing  to  another  phase  of  the  subject  the  analysis  con- 
tinues : 

If  the  hindrances  mentioned  are  out  of  the  way,  the  zeal  of  indus- 
try will  be  unrestrained,  and  its  fortunate  consequence  will  be  the 
perfection  of  manufactures.  Each  of  the  qualities  which  we  have 
specified  as  necessary  to  this  perfection  springs  from  a  multitude 
of  separate  parts,  knowledge  of  which  is  necessary,  and  it  will  not 
be  practicable  in  considering  them  not  to  cast  side  glances  at  foreign 
commerce  (§133). 

Thereupon  still  more  intensive  analysis  is  undertaken  of 
the  qualities  of  w^ares  posited  as  essential,  and  of  the  conditions 
requisite  to  insure  them.  Sees.  134-68  might  be  set  apart 
under  the  title,  "The  Elements  Which  Enter  into  the  Price  of 
Manufactured  Goods."  Sees.  169-82  might  be  entitled, 
"The  Elements  Which  Enter  into  the  Quality  of  Manufactured 
Goods."  Under  the  corresponding  title,  "The  Elements 
Which  Enter  into  the  Beauty  of  Manufactured  Goods,"  we 
should  mark  ofif  a  briefer  passage,  §§183,  184.  In  a  general 
way  an  appropriate  designation  for  the  remainder  of  the  chap- 
ter (§§185-202)  would  be,  "Factors  Involved  in  Assuring 
Variety  of  Goods."  The  details  are  largely  technical  primarily 
on  the  side,  of  manufacture,  or  trade,  or  administrative  policy, 
as  the  case  may  be;  and  so  do  not  fall  immediately  within  the 
scope  of  our  inquiry;  but  the  underlying  criterion  gives  the 
discussion  its  principal  significance.  The  persistent  question 
is  always  by  implication  ultimate:  "What  line  of  conduct 
will  conduce  to  the  largest  consuming  ability  of  the  largest 
number  of  people,  and  so  to  the  strength  of  the  state  ?" 

The  passage  cannot  be  dismissed  without  certain  minor 


564  THE  CAMERALISTS 

observations.  Thus,  the  discussion  of  the  terms  "cheap" 
[wohlfeil],  "price,"  and  "value"  reflects  a  critical  spirit  quite 
in  accord  with  that  of  Adam  Smith.' 

The  proposition  with  which  Sonnenfels  covers  the  whole 
subject  of  the  price  of  manufactured  goods  is : 

The  price  at  which  the  manufacturer  can  part  with  his  wares 
comprises  the  sum  of  all  the  separate  outlays  which  were  made  up 
to  the  time  of  sale,  with  addition  of  the  profit  (§136). 

This  decidedly  empirical  formula  is  then  translated  into 
detail.  The  elements  of  price  upon  what  the  author  puts 
emphasis  are: 

buildings,  lumber,  and  all  other  common  necessities,  purchase  of 
material,  wages,  carriages,  insurance  premiums,  import  and  export 
duties,  interest  on  the  capital,  exchange,  in  case  of  wares  requiring 
foreign  purchases,  and  profit. 

The  discussion  does  not  deal  with  abstractions,  but  general- 
izes business  prudence.  The  spirit  of  the  whole  may  be  illus- 
trated by  such  a  passage  as  the  following: 

Not  even  for  the  advantage  of  a  manufacture  established  in  the 
province  is  it  advisable  to  put  restrictions  on  removal  of  raw  material 
to  another  province.  For  this  outgo  will  not  occur  so  long  as  buyers 
are  to  be  found  in  the  locality  of  its  origin  who  offer  acceptable  terms 
of  purchase.  If  it  were  desired  however  to  give  the  manufacturer 
a  one-sided  advantage,  this  would  amount  to  promotion  of  industry 
[Aemsigkeit]  at  the  cost  of  land  management.  Then  only  can  the 
state  hope  for  permanent  advantage  when  it  supports  both  at  the 

•  As  evidence  we  may  quote  the  note  to  §135,  viz.:  "Die  Oekono- 
misten  erklaren  den  Werth:  Das  Maass  des  Bodens  welches  in  dor 
Erzielung  enthalten  ist.  Diescr  Begriff,  ist  eben  so  undcutlich,  als 
unrichtig.  Das  namliche  Maass  Erdreichs  von  besserer  oder  schlech- 
terer  physischen  Beschaffenhelt  mil  besserer  oder  schlechterer  Bestellung 
tragt  mehr:  also  wiirde  die  namliche  Sache  von  verschiedenem  Werthe 
seyn.  Der  Vcrfasser  des  Worts  (Works  ?)  Essai  sur  U  commerce  en 
giniral,  Part  I,  chap,  i,  setzl  dem  Maasse  des  Erdreichs  noch  die  Arbeit 
bei,  welches  den  Werth  zwar  naher  bcstimmt,  aber  immer  zu  metaphy- 
sisch  ausdriickt." 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  565 

same  time  .  .  .  .  ;  so  long  as  the  producer  can  get  a  proper  price 
for  raw  material,  constraint  is  unnecessary;  so  soon  however  as  the 
manufacturers  take  advantage  of  the  constraint  of  export  duties  and 
try  to  oppress  the  producer,  the  latter  abandons  the  unremunerative 
production,  and  the  manufacturer  suffers  from  lack  of  material 
(§141)- 

The  effect  upon  cost  of  raw  material  of  duties  on  imports 
and  exports  is  discussed  at  considerable  length.  Again,  the 
effect  of  numerous  holidays  upon  the  price  of  manufactured 
goods  is  analyzed,  and  on  the  ground  of  the  advantage  of  the 
state,  the  term  in  this  case  meaning  the  necessary  material 
prosperity  of  all  classes,  the  advisability  of  reducing  the  number 
is  urged,  in  spite  of  the  church.^  Further  (§153),  different 
situations  in  which  scarcity  of  laborers  is  the  decisive  factor 
are  intelligently  treated.  A  paragraph  follows  (§154)  on  the 
advantages  of  the  division  of  labor.  It  refers  to  the  classical 
passage  in  Adam  Smith's  Wealth  of  Nations,"  and  it  borrows 
from  that  passage  the  illustration  of  pin  manufacture.  Smith  is 
referred  to  merely  as  "  one  of  the  more  recent  English  writers," 
and  no  indication  appears  that  Sonnenfels  had  discovered  in 
him  any  radical  importance.  The  inventiveness  of  manufac- 
turers, turned  to  construction  of  machinery  which  saves  labor 
and  diminishes  that  item  of  cost,  is  next  in  order  (§155).  In 
this  connection  a  qualification  is  entered  which  plainly  illus- 
trates the  difference  between  the  puq^ose  which  Sonnenfels  had 
in  mind  and  the  sheer  capitalistic  standard : 

For  the  state,  cheapness  of  manufactured  goods  is  merely  a  sec- 
ondary purpose,  which  must  not  be  opposed  to  the  paramount  pur- 
pose, viz.,  the  multiplication  of  occupations.  Everywhere,  therefore, 
where  the  ways  to  occupation  are  in  such  precise  equilibrium  with 

»  In  this  connection  we  read  (§152):  "Man  liest  bei  Goldasten  in 
den  Reichshandlungen;"  and  a  little  later,  "  Fortbonnais  in  Disc,  praelim. 
turn  Negotiant  anglois." 

»  Book  I,  chap.  i. 


566  THE  CAMERALISTS 

the  population  that  the  portion  of  people  whose  place  would  be 
taken  by  machines  could  not  be  utilized  for  other  labor,  the  introduc- 
tion of  machines  would  be  harmful.  This  would  be  approximately 
the  situation  of  a  state  which  had  no  foreign  commerce  of  any  con- 
sequence. The  same  consideration  is  to  be  kept  in  view  in  the  case 
of  agriculture.  The  introduction  of  agricultural  machinery  would 
diminish  the  class  of  rural  folk,  and  for  the  state  nothing  is  so  desir- 
able as  to  see  this  class  as  numerous  as  possible. 

In  connection  with  the  subject  of  export  and  import  duties, 
as  a  factor  of  the  price  of  manufactured  goods,  another  indica- 
tion to  the  same  effect  appears  (§157).  Referring  to  "the 
almost  universal  assumption  that  customs  dues  are  to  be 
regarded  as  a  profitable  branch  of  the  public  revenues," 
Sonnenfels  says: 

Since  increase  of  price  in  the  first  instance  contradicts  the  para- 
mount purpose  of  commerce  it  is  necessary  to  criticize  this  theorem. 
As  certain  as  it  is  that  the  revenues  of  the  state  must  cover  the  expen- 
ditures, so  certain  is  it  also  that  inappropriate  means  may  be  selected 
for  raising  these  revenues.  Those  objects  then  will  be  inappropriate 
in  which  the  first  purpose  of  the  state,  viz.,  to  have  a  large  population, 
is  hindered,  because  the  impost  has  an  influence  on  occupation; 
in  which  case  what  may  be  gained  on  the  one  side  may  be  more  than 
lost  on  the  other,  and  in  which  by  virtue  of  their  very  nature,  no  fixed 
basis  of  assessment  can  be  assumed;  in  which,  finally,  the  collection 
of  the  money  revenues  is  not  in  accord  with  the  main  purpose,  for 
the  reason  that  although  large  sums  are  collected  the  main  purpose 
is  not  promoted;  or  if  this  purpose  is  reached,  the  revenues  would 
have  to  be  raised  to  an  impossible  amount.  All  of  this  may  be 
proved  in  the  case  of  customs  [Miiuthe].^ 

The  argument  is  continued  in  §§158-65.  The  claim  is 
urged  that  import  duties  are  taxes  on  consumption  and  tend 
to  diminish  the  output  of  wealth.  They  are  only  admissible, 
under  ordinary  circumstances,  when  they  do  not  have  this 

»  The  author  refers  to  his  Abhandlung  vom  Maulhwesen  in  the  tenth 
volume  of  his  collected  works. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  567 

effect.    An  export  tax  discourages  foreign  use  of  the  ware, 
and  so  limits  domestic  occupation. 

Consequently  the  finances  purchase  their  momentary  advantage 
at  a  much  too  high  price,  through  the  loss  of  land  management 
whose  stuff  is  in  less  demand,  and  through  the  harm  to  industry 
whose  earnings  are  in  the  same  degree  lessened. 

On  the  distinction  between  two  kinds  of  commerce  noted 
above,  a  passage  (p.  242)  is  a  commentary.  Speaking  of  the 
part  played  by  general  frugality  if  it  does  not  descend  to  a 
stinginess  which  limits  the  national  output  more  than  foreign 
trade  extends  it,  Sonnenfels  says: 

A  state  which  in  the  last  analysis  possesses  only  an  economic 
trade,  cannot  carry  exclusiveness  [Hduslichkeii]  in  its  mode  of  life 
too  far  without  provoking  other  states,  whose  trade  is  based  upon 
their  own  products,  to  imitate  this  policy  with  equal  vigor. 

A  sample  of  a  different  sort  will  show  how  minutely  Sonnen- 
fels' technology  calculated  cause  and  effect  from  the  standpoint 
of  the  state.  It  occurs  in  the  sections  on  the  relations  of  the 
qualities  of  goods  to  price.  The  custom  of  requiring  of  young 
artisans  a  certain  number  of  Wanderjakre  before  they  were 
allowed  to  work  at  their  trade  in  their  own  locality  had  been 
referred  to  as  on  the  whole  tending  to  vagrancy.  The  author, 
however,  adds  (§174): 

Considered  from  one  point  of  view,  however,  these  migrations 
should  not  be  abolished,  but  better  regulated.  Only  the  most 
talented  should  be  sent  abroad,  and  that  with  the  previous  knowledge 
of  the  state,  and  with  certain  assistance.  According  to  their  branch 
of  trade  the. places  to  which  they  should  go  should  be  designated, 
and  they  should  be  recommended  to  the  embassies  at  those  places. 
In  this  way  the  emigrations  would  be  profitable  in  gaining  for 
domestic  wares  the  envied  perfection  of  foreign  goods.' 

'  In  continuing  the  subject  of  the  effect  of  the  quality  of  products 
on  price,  Sonnenfels  cites  (note  to  §176)  Savary,  Dictionaire  du  Commerce, 
T.  IV,  art.  "  Rfeglement,"  and  Justi,  Abhandlung  von  Manu/acturen, 
Fabriken  Reglements. 


568  THE  CAMERALISTS 

A  little  later  (§179)  Sonnenfels  epitomizes  the  objections 
to  Meisterrecht,  and  particularly  to  Manufacliirregletnent,  die 
Inspektionen  und  Beschauanstalten,  in  a  volume  translated 
from  the  English,  with  the  title  rendered  from  a  French  version, 
Versuch  iiher  die  Meisterschaften.  The  autlior's  name  is  not 
given.  The  l)ook  urges  the  abolition  of  the  institutions  named. 
The  reasons  are  evidently  those  of  very  narrow  selfishness. 
Sonnenfels  takes  the  position  that  every  one  of  them  may  be 
answered  in  favor  of  continuing  existing  or  similar  regulations 
and  supervision,  by  consideration  of  the  general  welfare.  A 
little  later,  speaking  of  the  policy  of  encouraging  settlement 
of  skilled  laborers  from  abroad,  Hume,  Geschichte  des  Hauses 
Tudor,  T.  Ill,  is  cited  as  authority  for  the  statement  that 
Henry  VH,  instigated  by  an  outcry  of  women,  drove  1 5,000  arti- 
sans, mostly  French,  from  London.  Sonnenfels  charges 
England  with  still  maintaining  essentially  the  same  attitude.* 

'  Further  references  in  the  chapter  are  as  follows:  "In  den  Briefen 
(Ics  La  Porte,"  cited  from  memory,  p.  273;  in  a  note  on  p.  279  the  author 
remarks:  "Die  Errichtung  der  Manufacturhauser  ist  vor  Justi  schon 
von  Bodcn  in  seiner  fUrstUchen  Machlkunst,  von  Schrodern  in  seiner 
Jurstlichen  Schaiz-  und  Renlkammer,  u.  a.  m.,  als  ein  niitzliches  Mittel 
angcpricsen  wordcn;"  then  follows  reference  to  Justi's  monograph, 
Von  Maniifacluren  und  Fabriken.  Justi  is  blamed  for  giving  Schroder 
an  empty  compliment  for  proposing  that  manufactures  should  be  assisted 
by  a  scheme  of  landesfiirstlichen  Wechsel,  an  impracticable  notion,  in 
Sonnenfels'  opinion.  Fortbonais,  Elem.  du  Com.,  chap,  iii,  reappears, 
p.  283,  and,  in  the  same  note,  Hume,  Polit.  Essays  0/  the  Balance  0/ 
Trade  (sic);  aUe  Physiokraten  are  referred  to  at  the  same  point,  the 
implication  being  that  they  universally  support  a  prohibitive  policy  with 
respect  to  imiK>rts;  Rcimarus,  HandlungsgrundsiUze,  is  named  without 
indicating  the  reason;  a  second  note  on  the  same  page  (p.  283)  contains 
a  rather  pointed  criticism,  viz.,  "England,  France,  even  Holland,  has 
prohibitions  of  imports,  and  what  amounts  to  the  same  thing,  high 
entrance  rights.  When  therefore  many  a  writer  confidently  asserts 
that  commerce  flourishes  most  in  stales  where  universal  freedom  of  trade 
rules,  we  are  justilic«l  in  dcman<ling  that  these  states  shall  be  specified;" 
and  finally  (p.  2(/^),  Nickols;  vide  above,  p.  556. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  569 

We  pass  to  chap,  iii,  "On  Foreign  Commerce."  In  the 
previous  chapter  Sonnenfels  had  shown  a  decidedly  oppor- 
tunistic attitude  toward  regulation  of  foreign  trade.  On  the 
whole,  he  is  inclined  to  assume  that  artificial  restrictions  of 
the  spontaneous  course  of  trade  are  likely  to  work  more  harm 
than  good.  At  the  same  time  he  holds  firmly  that  it  is  entirely 
within  the  competence  of  the  state  to  enforce  all  sorts  of  restric- 
tions, provided  they  actually  tend  to  promote  the  main  end, 
viz.,  the  multiplication  of  '^occupations,"  and  thus  the  increase 
of  population.  Besides  details  under  this  principal  proposition, 
and  technical  specifications  with  which  we  are  not  concerned, 
the  chapter  contains  little  that  is  germane  to  our  purpose. 
A  leading  theorem  is  that,  "The  ground  of  speculation 
is  knowledge  of  foreign  countries"  (p.  205).  The  author's 
expansion  of  the  idea  shows  sagacity  of  a  high  order,  and  again 
it  must  be  said  that  Sonnenfels  might  be  read  at  this  point 
with  profit  by  everyone  who  is  directly  or  indirectly  connected 
with  foreign  trade  or  the  diplomatic  intercourse  which  is  based 
upon  commercial  interests.  The  rudiments  of  the  duties  of 
diplomatic  and  consular  representatives,  as  so  long  and  well 
understood  in  Germany,  and  so  tardily  practiced  in  America, 
are  distinctly  set  forth.  Sonnenfels  writes  rather  as  a  learner 
from  other  nations  on  this  subject  than  as  a  eulogist  of  German 
policy.    For  example,  he  remarks  (§207): 

England  especially  has  selected  as  ambassadors  men  of  funda- 
mental insight  into  the  commercial  system;  such  were  "rft'e  Kecne, 
Casires,  Fallqucncr,  Porter,  Walpole,'\  in  Spain,  Portugal,  Turkey, 
and  France.' 

'  A  bibliographical  item  is  to  be  noted.  Sec.  221  expands  the  con- 
clusion: "Summing  up  both  sides,  we  may  say  with  Raynal:  'Fairs  and 
markets  in  themselves  are  a  mischievous  recourse,  but  occasionally  they 
are  serviceable.'  "  A  note  adds:  "  Histoire  polU.  et  phil.  des  etablisse- 
mens  de  deux  Indes,  T.  IV.  Der  Verfasser  fiihrt  die  Erfindung  der 
Messen  zu  dem  7ten  Jahrhundert  zuriick:    als  durch  die  Einfalle  der 


570  THE  CAMERALISTS 

The  drift  of  the  chapter  may  be  gathered  from  a  part  of 
the  closing  section  (§223).     The  opening  sentences  read: 

In  order  therefore  not  to  diminish  the  useful  class  of  merchants, 
the  state  should  make  common  cause  with  them.  Instead  of  grant- 
ing letters  of  nobility  to  rich  merchants  upon  retirement  from  business 
it  should  rather  ennoble  the  merchant  only  upon  condition  that  he 
shall  continue  to  carry  on  commerce,  and  shall  bring  up  his  children 
to  the  same  occupation.  The  state  should  offer  nobility  to  him  who, 
with  certain  resources,  passes  from  another  stratum  into  the  ranks 
of  the  merchants.  On  occasions  where  distinctions  are  to  be  drawn 
between  classes  of  the  people,  for  instance,  at  court  festivities,  the 
state  should  include  the  merchant  class  among  the  distinguished. 
The  protection  of  the  state  must  be  extended  to  the  large,  as  well 
as  to  the  small  trades,  etc' 

The  standpoint  of  chap,  iv,  "On  Colonies"  may  be  indi- 
cated in  brief  in  accordance  with  the  analysis  in  §224,  viz.: 

Colonies  have  the  significance  and  the  purpose,  first,  of  promoting 
external  security;  second,  of  promoting  commerce;  third,  of  promot- 
ing navigation. 

A  fundamental  presumption  is  frankly  expressed  in  §225, 
viz.: 

The  mother  state  will  have  the  preference  over  every  other 
country  in  drawing  from  the  colonies  those  wants  which  it  will  either 
use  itself  or  again  export.    And  in  general,  whenever  a  decision  must 

Franken  und  Barbaren  in  Gallien  die  Handlung  durch  ungeheure,  und 
unzahlige  Gebiihren  gehemmet  ward.  Die  erste  Messe  war  zu  St.  Denys 
gestiftct  worden.  S.  den  Art.  Foire  in  der  Encyclopedie,  welche  Target 
zum  Vcrfasser  hat."  The  following  section  (§222)  has  a  reference  to 
"Coyer,  La  noblesse  commer(ant." 

'  This  note  follows:  "Die  Selige  Kaiscrin  liess  einst  dem  ganzen 
Handelsstand  die  Adelung  anbieten.  Viele  aus  demselben  machten 
von  diesem  Anerbieten  Gebrauch,  und  fiihren  dann  auch  geadelt  den 
Handel  immer  fort.  Die  Erhebung  in  den  Freyherren,  und  nachher 
in  den  Grafenstand,  und  die  Stelle  eines  K.  K.  Hofraths  hielt  H.  Fries 
nicht  ab,  seine  Geschafte  mit  eben  demselben  Eifer  fortzusetzen,  ais  cr 
vorher  gethan  hat." 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  571 

be  made  between  foreigners  and  the  colonists,  the  state  will  seek 
to  secure  the  advantage  for  the  latter.  Whenever,  on  the  other  hand, 
a  question  arises  between  the  state  and  the  colonies,  the  state  appro- 
priates the  advantage  to  itself,  and  deals  with  the  colonies  in  complete 
accordance  with  the  principles  of  foreign  commerce.  That  is, 
everything  which  the  colonies  supply  will  be  accepted  only  in  the 
simplest  form.  On  the  contrary,  whatever  is  supplied  to  the  colo- 
nies they  must  consent  to  take  in  the  most  complete  form.  Thence 
the  mother  state  derives  the  increased  advantage:  it  gets  its  wants 
in  the  easiest  and  supplies  the  wants  of  the  colonies  in  the  most 
profitable  way,  since  it  increases  occupation  at  home  through  the 
consumption  of  the  colonists.  These  advantages  are  all  the  greater 
since  the  home  government  prescribes  laws  for  the  colonies,  and  can 
exclude  all  rivals  from  trade  with  them.  Consequently  the  mer- 
chants of  the  mother  state  are  to  be  regarded  as  to  a  certain  extent 
monopolists  as  respects  the  colonies. 

After  a  few  more  specifications  to  the  same  effect,  Sonnen- 
fels  shows  that  he  is  by  no  means  in  sympathy  with  the  policy 
which  he  faithfully  analyzes.    He  says  (§228): 

Such  are  the  chief  principles  in  accordance  with  which  mother 
states  treat  their  colonies:  principles  of  armed  power,  against 
defenseless  weakness,  to  the  injustice  of  which  the  lust  of  expansion 

and  the  mercantile  spirit  blind  all  nations When  the  English, 

who  regard  private  property  in  their  own  island  as  so  inviolable,  but 
treat  with  contempt  the  property  of  inoffensive  peoples  in  other  parts 
of  the  world,  when  they,  even  yet  in  our  century,  take  possession  of 
every  island  on  which  they  land,  in  the  name  of  his  British  Majesty, 
are  they  nevertheless  in  the  eyes  of  mankind  the  honorable 
[achtungswiirdig]  nation  in  which  the  concepts  of  freedom  and 
right  seem  almost  exclusively  to  have  been  preserved?  ....  But 
however  many  the  advantages  which  are  drawn  from  the  colonics, 
their  possession  will  continue  only  so  long  as  the  colonists  are 
kept  in  the  ignorance,  out  of  which  time,  the  efforts  of  rival 
nations,  and  the  confluence  of  favoring  conditions,  will  sooner  or 
later,  but  certainly,  some  time  remove  them,  and  will  put  an  end  to 
their  dependence. 


572  THE  CAMERALISTS 

A  note  comments: 

This  was  written  in  the  year  1763;  the  outcome  of  the  war  with 
America  converts  it  into  a  prophecy. 

Chap.  V,  on  "Land  Carriage," calls  for  two  observations  only. 
In  the  first  place,  we  may  note  its  bibliographical  citations.' 

In  the  second  place,  we  must  recognize  the  continued  atten- 
tive elaboration  of  administrative  detail.  The  chapter  con- 
tains hardly  more  than  titles  of  subjects  which  have  to  be  dealt 
with  in  securing  all  possible  advantage  to  the  state  from  means 
of  internal  communication  by  land,  but  merely  as  a  programme 
or  as  a  catalogue  of  items  to  be  kept  in  view  by  the  state,  it  is 
a  notable  reflection  of  the  cameralistic  spirit.  The  details 
to  be  dealt  with  by  government  under  this  head  are  all  con- 
sidered as  "means  of  increasing  the  national  occupation." 
They  vary  from  construction  and  repair  of  roads,  the  encourage- 
ment and  control  of  carriers,  the  provision  and  regulation  of 
inns,  stables,  and  storehouses  for  the  men,  animals,  and  goods 
engaged  in  transportation,  to  maintenance  of  the  various  trades, 
wheelrights,  saddlers,  smiths,  etc.,  necessary  for  conducting 
the  repairs  incidental  to  land  traffic. 

Substantially  the  same  is  all  that  need  be  said  of  each 
remaining  chapter  in  the  book.     In  the  first  place,  the  printed 

'  Viz.:  first,  referring  to  Cromwell's  "Navigation  Act"  of  1651,  a 
note  remarks  (p.  351):  "Ich  kenne  nur  den  Verfasser  der  Handlungs- 
grundsiUze  zur  wahren  Aufnahme  der  Lander,  etc.,  §13,  welcher  gegen 
wahren  Vortheil  dieser  Akte  einen  Zweifel  zu  erheben  scheint."  On 
p.  356  the  following  occurs:  "  Das  Werk  von  Bergier,  Histoire  des  grands 
chemins  d' Empire,  ist  alien  unentbehrlich,  die  diesen  Theil  der  Verwal- 
tung  zu  besorgen  haben.  Gautier,  Von  Anlage  und  Baue  der  Wege  und 
Stadtstrassen  aus  dem  Franz.,  ist  eine  kleine  Schrift  von  vieler  Brauch- 
barkcit."  Again,  p.  358:  "Sur  les  Corvees  ist  bereits  in  der  Sammlung 
von  Mirabcau  aus  Schriften  unter  dem  Namen:  Ami  des  hommes,  eine 
schone  Abhandlung  eingcschaltet."  On  p.  363  the  vagrant  observation 
appears:  "Kines  ungenannten  Anmerkung  fiber  den  Gebrauch  und 
Nutxen  des  Inlelligenswesens." 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  573 

sources  to  which  the  author  acknowledged  himself  indebted 
must  be  noted. ^ 

«  In  general  it  may  be  observed  that  dependence  upon  Forbonnais 
becomes  more  evident  from  this  point.  On  p.  367  is  this  note:  "Es 
kann  meine  Absicht  nicht  seyn,  von  der  Marine  anders  zu  handeln,  als 
nach  der  allgemeinen  Verbindung  derselben  mit  der  politischen  Handlung. 
Um  wenigstens  sich  nur  einen  Begriff  derselben  zu  machen,  wird  La 
Science  de  la  Marine  par  Villeneuve,  und  das  Dictionaire  de  la  Marine 
zureichen." 

On  admiralty  law,  the  author  remarks  (p.  375):  "  Die  Quellen  dieser 
Seerechte  sind  des  Harmenopolus  Sammlung  der  legum  Rhodiarum;  die 
Spanische  Sammlung  von  1057,  welche  unter  dem  Namen  consolato  del 
Mare  bekannt,  das  wisbysche  Wasser-  und  Seerechtsbuch,  die  olero- 
nischen  und  hanseatischen  Seerechte,  die  liibekischen  Seerechte,  von 
denen  Stein  eine  Abhandlung  entworfen  hat;  die  englische  Akte;  die 
ordonnance  de  la  marine  von  Ludwig  dem  XIV.  Hierzu  sind  die  Ver- 
trage,  und  das  Seeherkommen  zu  rechnen:  von  welchen  in  dem  fiir  die 
innerOsterreichische  Sehiffahrt  entworfenem  Editto  Marino  einige 
Anwendung  gemacht  ist."  A  sentence  or  two  before  this  passage, 
Sonnenfels  refers  to  Curland,  Grundsdtze  des  europdischen  Seerechts, 
and  this  work  was  apparently  his  leading  authority. 

Referring  to  the  history  of  men's  efforts  to  improve  inland  water 
communication,  a  note  (p.  382)  says:  "Diese  Geschichte  hat  H.  Oberlin 
in  3  lateinischen  Werken  gesammelt  und  bis  auf  unsere  Zeiten  fortge- 
setzt.  I,  Prisca;  II,  media  aevi;  III,  jungendorum  marium  fluminumque 
omnis  aevi  molimina.  Die  osterreich.  Staaten  sind  von  vielen  Fliissen 
durchstromt,  deren  Vereinigung  moglich  ist,  und  woriiber  viele  Entwiirfp 
gemacht  worden.  Besonders  miissen  irgend  in  den  Archiven,  oder 
Registraturen  die  Entwvirfe  vom  Philibert  Luchese,  iiber  einige  Flusse 
der  Monarchic  aufbehalten  seyn.  Vielleicht  sind  die  Entwiirfe,  welche 
H.  Maire  tiber  die  Vereinigung  der  Flusse,  in  den  sammtlichen  Staaten 
des  Hauses  Oesterreich  heraus  gegeben,  und  in  einem  sogenannten 
Mimoire  raisonrU  sur  la  circtdation  intirieure  du  commerce,  etc.,  erklart 
hat,  nicht  durchaus  ausfvihrbar;  aber  dass  es  ein  grosser  Theil  derselben 
ist,  kann  nicht  gezweifelt  werden  und  die  Entwiirfe  zeigen:  wie  vor- 
theilhaft  die  Handlung  aller  erblandischen  Provinzen  unter  sich  ver- 
bunden  werden  konnte." 

In  chap,  vii,  on  "Insurance" — chiefly  marine  insurance — the  only 
writer  directly  referred  to  is  Forbonnais  (p.  394,  et  passim). 

In  chap,  viii  (ix),  on  "Money,"  Justi  is  apparently  the  guide  whom 


574  THE  CAMERALISTS 

In  the  second  place,  these  chapters  are  cumulative  evidence 
that  the  center  of  gravity  in  Sonncnfels'  system  was  shifting 
its  position.  It  does  not  appear  that  he  was  conscious  of  it. 
He  does  not  directly  substitute  another  aim  for  the  strengthen- 
ing of  the  state  which  had  been  ultimate  with  the  other  cameral- 
ists.  He  returns  frequently  to  some  variation  of  the  constant 
theme  that  the  state  must  look  out  that  the  proper  thing  is 
done  in  all  these  relations,  but  the  reader  cannot  fail  to  detect 
an  infusion  of  more  of  the  spirit  of  gain  for  the  sake  of  gain, 
which  distinguishes  the  specifically  commercial  from  the  typi- 

Sonnenfels  mainly  trusts.  On  p.  423  he  mentions  him,  and  in  a  note 
(p.  426)  he  says,  of  the  particular  monograph  referred  to  {Ursachen  des 
verderbten  Munzwesens  in  Deutschland,  und  Mittel  dagegen):  "Dieser 
Vorschlag  ist  eigentlich  nur  eine  Zuriickfiihrung  der  Miinzenbenennungen 
zu  ihrem  Ursprunge."  In  a  previous  note  (p.  525)  he  says:  "Die 
Schriftsteller  welche  von  den  Grundsiitzen  der  Miinzpragung  handeln, 
haben  iib^r  diesen  Gegenstand  so  viele  Dunkelheit  verbreitet,  dass  sie 
Anfjinger  ganz  kleinmiithig  machen.  Diese  Dunkelheit  riihrt  daher, 
weil  sie  den  Grundsatzen  eine  Menge  angewendeter  Rechnungsbeispiele 
mit  untermengen,  die  nicht  zu  den  Grundsatzen,  sondern  Zum  prak- 
tischen  Theile  des  Munzwesens  gehoren." 

Sec.  291  cites  Melon,  Essai  politique  sur  le  commerce,  2te.  Aufl.; 
also,  Dutot,  Reflexions  politiques  sur  les  finances  et  le  commerce,  and 
Fortbonnais,  Anfangsgriinde,  II.  Tom.,  chap,  ix,  "De  la  circulation." 

In  chap,  ix,  on  "The  Circulation  of  Money,"  there  is  a  reference 
to  "Montesq.,  Esprit  des  loix,  Liv.  22,  "Principes  sur  le  commerce;" 
to  Hume,  E^say  of  the  Balance  0/  Trade;"  to  "folgende  Stelle  Ustaritzes," 
viz.,  Theorie  b"  pratique  du  commerce,  Cap.  Ill  am  Ende;  Vol.  Ill,  p.  150, 
has  the  reference:  "  Ustarilz,  Consider,  sur  les  financ  {sic)  d'E^pagne;" 
to  "Plinius,  paneg.  Traj.,"  to  "X.  Band  meiner  gesammelten  Schriften: 
Abhandlung  von  der  Ursache  der  Theurung  in  grossen  Stddten  und  dem 
Mittel,  ihr  abzuhel/en;"  on  p.  494  Hume  is  quoted  again  as  authority 
for  the  statement  that  although  during  the  minority  of  Edward  (VI  ?) 
interest  was  prohibited  in  England,  the  rate  was  14  per  cent.  (Inciden- 
tally we  may  note  that  Sonnenfels  uses  "die  Interessen"  interchangeably 
with  "die  Zinsen.")  Raynal  is  cited  (p.  496)  as  authority  for  tracing 
disbelief  in  the  justice  of  interest  to  the  Middle  Ages.  The  Justinian 
Code  is  cited  (p.  499):   "4.  Buch,  31.  Tit.,  26.  Gesetze,"  and  five  pages 


CAMERALTSTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  575 

cally  political  standpoint,  and  which  was,  consciously  or  uncon- 
sciously, the  animus  of  theSmithian  political  economy.  Although 
Sonnenfels  had  only  in  the  faintest  degree  begun  to  generalize 
economic  problems  in  the  Smithian  manner,  his  dealing  with  the 
technique  of  the  subjects  treated  in  the  last  half  of  this  volume 
was  distinctly  an  approximation  to  the  Smithian  method. 

For  various  reasons,  Vol.  Ill,  Finanzwissenschaft,  must 
be  much  more  summarily  treated  than  the  other  two.  A  few 
of  its  general  characteristics,  however,  should  be  pointed  out, 
and  this  may  be  done  in  the  form  of  disconnected  notes. 

later  "der  Verfasser  des  Werks,  Des  corps  politiques."  On  p.  508, 
referring  to  the  advantages  of  a  low  rate  of  interest,  a  note  begins: 
"  Dieser  Gegenstand  ist  vorziiglich  in  englischen  Schriftstellern  behandelt 
worden."  Child  and  Culpeper  are  named.  Then  follows  the  remark: 
"In  der  Sammlung  von  politischen  Abhandlungen,  die  in  V  Banden 
1750  zu  Amsterdam  bei  Schenchzern  erschien,  sind  die  verschiedenen 
fiir  und  wider  die  Interesseherabsitzung  in  dem  Parlemente  gehaltenen 
Reden,  aufbehalten,  am  ausfuhrlichsten  sind  Lockes  Briefe,  welche  unter 
dem  Titel:  Betrachtung  iiber  die  Miinze,  Geldzinse,  Finanz  und  Handlung 
gesammelt  sind.  Auch  die  Vorrede,  welche  Fortbonais  der  Uebersetzung 
des  British  Merchant  vorausgesendet  hat,  ist  eine  eigene  und  mit  vieler 
Griindlichkeit  geschriebene  Abhandlung  iiber  die  gesetzmdssige  Zinsherab- 
setzung."  On  p.  519,  "Dio  Kassius"  is  drawn  upon  for  an  illustration 
of  the  effect  of  a  sudden  increase  of  money  in  circulation  in  raising  prices, 
and  at  the  same  time  lowering  the  rate  of  interest,  and  Hume's  "  Essay 
of  the  Balance  of  Trade"  is  again  referred  to  (p.  520).  In  chap,  xi,  on 
"Trading  Companies,"  Raynal,  "Hist,  polit.  et  Philos.,  etc.,"  is  again 
used  as  a  source;  in  chap,  xii,  on  "Exchange,"  Fortbonais,  chap,  viii, 
again  appears  to  be  the  author's  point  of  departure,  and  Dutot  {op.  cit.) 
is  once  more  named.  Siegel,- Einleitung  turn  Wechselrechte,  and  the  same 
author's  "Corpus  juris  cambialis,  welches  Herr  Usal  fortgesetzt  hat," 
are  listed  at  the  end  of  the  chapter.  Chap,  xiii,  on  "  Commercial  Treaties," 
mentions  "die  kleine  Schrift  Les  avantages  que  le  Portugal  pourroit  tirer 
de  son  malheur."  Chap,  xix,  on  "The  Balance  of  Trade,"  quotes  Hume 
"in  dem  Versuch  iiber  die  Handlungsbilanz."  At  the  same  time  it  is 
asserted  that  "die  Physiokraten  halten  die  Berechnung  der  Bilanz  fiir 
iiberfliissig."  The  volume  closes  with  the  note:  "S.  X.  Band  meiner 
gesammelten  Schriften  Abhand.  von  der  Mauth." 


576  THE  CAMERALISTS 

The  title-page  is  a  duplicate  of  that  of  the  first  two  volumes 
with  the  exception  that  the  vignette  represents  Maximilien  de 
Berthume,  due  de  Sully, 

In  the  Preface  of  the  first  edition  the  author  indicates  his 
purpose  to  occupy  an  intermediate  position  between  two 
classes  among  the  numerous  writers  on  the  subject,  viz.,  first, 
those  who  have  exaggerated  their  systems  into  Utopias;  second, 
those  who  have  tried  to  reduce  policies  of  oppressive  exploita- 
tion to  an  art.  These  latter  talk  only  of  enriching  the  treasury. 
They  ask  how  much  may  be  taken  from  the  citizen  without 
bringing  him  to  the  threshold  of  extreme  poverty. 

These  contemptible  hirelings  of  tyranny  resemble  the  hunting- 
dog  that  scares  up  the  game  for  the  hunter  in  order  to  feed  on  its 
entrails. 

A  third  type  which,  to  be  sure,  is  very  small,  aims  at  a  quite 
different  purpose,  viz.,  the  honor  of  standing  for  the  interest  of  the 
people  [des  Volkes].  These  have  to  reckon  with  the  ruler,  and  to 
challenge  every  expenditure  which  exceeds  reasonable  needs. 

In  this  passage  Sonnenfels  applies  the  word  Kammeral- 
schriftsteller  to  a  class  of  writers  on  finance  who  correspond 
to  the  term  Oekonomieaufsehtr,  as  used  above.*  That  is,  he 
asserts  that  they  knew  nothing  of  the  broad  principles  of  finance 
but  fill  their  books  with  the  most  minute  details  of  private 
thrift.  These  petty  people  should  have  confined  their  pride 
entirely  to  writing  for  zealous  administrative  employees,  who 
might  have  read  their  books  with  advantage.  According  to 
this  passage,  then,  Sonnenfels  repudiated  the  name  "cameral- 
ist;"  but  that  was  a  matter  of  words,  and  it  does  not  separate 
him  in  fact  from  the  series  of  writers  whom  we  are  considering. 

As  between  the  types  thus  characterized  Sonnenfels  hints, 
rather  than  directly  says,  that  he  intends  to  write  with  a  view 
to  the  general  prosperity,  rather  than  chiefly  in  the  interest 
of  the  national  treasury.    He  declares  that  he  proposes  to 

»  Vide  p.  548. 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  577 

write  principles  of  finance,  not  a  finance  encyclopaedia;  and 
he  advertises  the  freedom  and  independence  with  which  he 
intends  to  treat  the  problems.  In  this  last  respect  he  gives 
the  impression  of  protesting  too  much.  His  language  serves 
chiefly  to  remind  the  reader  of  the  difficulty  of  making  any 
presumption  except  the  governmental  one  tolerable  to  rulers. 
Although  Sonnenfels  praises  the  magnanimity  of  the  empress, 
which  had  protected  his  freedom  of  teaching,  we  read  between 
the  lines  that  he  was  consciously  approaching  delicate  subjects, 
and  he  wanted  to  conciliate  the  civic  powers  as  much  as  possible. 
The  Preface  to  the  present  edition  contains  a  paragraph 
which  expresses  the  author's  attitude  toward  bibliography, 
viz.: 

In  respect  to  the  books  to  which  I  have  referred  in  this  as  well 
as  in  the  first  and  second  parts,  I  have  this  to  say:  that  my  inten- 
tion in  such  references  was  not  to  furnish  a  literary  encyclopaedia. 
The  reader  or  student  does  not  want  a  mere  list  of  writings,  brought 
together  from  catalogues  and  unreliable  journals,  without  selection 
and  very  often  without  knowledge.  He  wishes  to  get  acquainted 
with  good  writings,  from  which  he  may  extend  the  principles  which 
he  has  gained,  and  in  which  he  may  find  further  information  about 
this  or  that  subject.  With  this  purpose  alone  in  view  I  have  listed 
books,  and  none  others  than  those  which  I  have  myself  read  and  of 
which  I  can  give  assurance  that  they  will  repay  the  trouble  of  con- 
sulting or  reading  them. 

It  is  perhaps  a  virtue  rather  than  a  fault  of  the  first  two 
volumes,  that  they  appear  to  have  been  drawn  more  from  obser- 
vation than  from  previous  writers.  Whether  it  is  a  virtue  or 
not,  the  internal  evidence  does  not  strongly  sustain  a  literal 
version  of  the  above  claim  to  personal  acquaintance  with  all 
the  books  cited  in  the  parts  already  discussed.  In  this  third 
part  the  citations  are  more  frequent,  but  this  fact  merely 
reflects  the  state  of  the  available  literature. 

It  should  be  noticed  too  that  the  volume  now  before  us  is 


S78  THE  CAMERALISTS 

full  of  vivid  side-lights  upon  the  issues  which  were  then  seething 
in  all  the  political  pots  of  Europe.  Nowhere  did  the  funda- 
mental issue,  government  for  the  sake  of  the  citizen  or  the 
citizen  for  the  sake  of  government,  come  to  more  distinct 
definition  than  in  policies  of  taxation.  The  day  after  the 
Preface  to  this  fifth  edition  of  the  third  volume  was  written, 
the  Assembly  of  Notables  at  Versailles  was  dissolved.  Reduced 
to  the  concrete,  the  Revolution  was  an  assertion  that  taxes 
should  thereafter  leave  Frenchmen  a  living.  The  Revolution 
told  the  rest  of  Europe  that  the  battle  could  be  won.  In  this 
academic  book  one  feels  the  tug  of  the  vested  interests  upon  the 
earnings  of  the  masses,  but  what  is  better,  one  feels  the  force 
of  a  moral  judgment  that  the  masses  must  not  be  sacrificed  to 
institutions.  There  is  no  assertion  of  a  new  social  principle 
here.  There  is,  however,  assertion  that  old  social  principles 
must  be  applied  with  changed  emphasis.  So  understood 
the  book  is  a  vivid  document  of  political  reconstruction. 

On  p.  2  Sonnenfels  gives  his  definition  of  the  science  of 
finance,  viz.: 

The  more  necessary  is  it,  therefore,  for  those  interested  in  this 
important  part  of  administration  to  be  guided  by  well-considered 
principles  according  to  which  the  revenues  of  the  state  nmy  he  most 
advantageously  raised.  These  collected  principles  are  the  science 
of  finance  [Finanzwissenschaft]. 

The  author's  formulation  of  the  standpoint  from  which 
these  principles  are  to  be  considered  may  be  summarized  as 
follows:  In  the  first  place,  we  may  reduce  the  general  process 
of  financial  administration,  according  to  his  analysis,  to  four 
stages,  viz. :  first,  estimate  of  the  needs  of  the  state,  and  draw- 
ing up  a  corresponding  budget  [StaatsaufwandsUberschlag]; 
second,  determination  of  the  resources  of  the  state;  third,  by 
comparing  the  former  with  the  latter,  discovery  of  the  propor- 
tion of  the  resources  which  it  will  be  necessary  to  use  in  order 
to  cover  the  needs;  fourth,  the  technique  of  assessing  and  col- 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  579 

lecting  the  revenues.  Without  attempting  to  reproduce  the 
author's  doctrines  of  the  limits  within  which  the  idea  of  the 
ordinary  and  extraordinary  needs  of  the  state  must  be  defined, 
we  note,  first,  that  the  sources  of  revenue  are  divided  into 
two  classes,  viz. :  the  mediate  and  the  immediate  contributions 
of  the  citizens  (§15).  The  former  class  includes  revenues  from 
all  those  sources  which  are  the  common  property  of  the  citizens : 
crown  estates,  regalian  rights,  etc.  The  second  class  includes 
all  revenues  which  are  derived  from  payments  by  individuals. 
As  an  ideal  principle,  the  former  class  should  cover  the  ordinary 
expenses  of  the  state,  while  the  latter  should  be  the  means  of 
discharging  the  extraordinary  expenses  (§§i8,  19). 

Then  follows  a  most  characteristic  and  illuminating  propo- 
sition, viz.: 

The  contribution  to  the  extraordinary  expenses  must  be  arranged 
according  to  the  multitudinous  circumstances  in  which  the  state 
finds  itself,  always  however  without  allowing  attention  to  wander 
from  the  well-being  of  the  citizens,  which  remains  under  all  circum- 
stances the  ultimate  purpose  of  every  expenditure  (§20). 

More  than  a  mere  verbal  variation  is  involved  in  this  dictum. 
Instead  of  the  conventional  WoM  des  Staates,  or  the  noncom- 
mittal phrase  which  occurs  in  the  Preface  of  the  first  edition, 
"</*«  Sache  des  Volkes"  we  now  have  "das  Wohl  der  BUrger." 
Of  course  it  would  be  absurd  to  rest  an  important  conclusion 
upon  a  single  phrase.  It  is  hardly  probable  that  Sonnenfels 
was  distinctly  aware  of  meaning  anything  different  by  this 
phrase  from  the  ideas  conventionally  associated  with  the  terms 
in  more  frequent  use.  A  diflference  between  two  stages  of 
civilization  might  be  expressed  in  the  contrasts  between  the 
conventional  concepts  connoted  by  the  technical  phrases  der 
Staaty  or  das  Volk,  and  the  democratic  phrase,  die  Biirger. 
The  two  former  presuppose  an  entity  in  antithesis  with  the 
individual  citizens,  or  a  mystic  collectivity  in  which  the  r61e 
of  the  individual  citizen  is  an  after  consideration.    The  latter 


580  THE  CAMERALISTS 

phrase  connotes  a  conception  that  there  is  no  whole  except  that 
composed  of  the  individuals  whose  co-operation  gives  reality 
to  the  state.  Even  conceding  that  Sonnenfels  consciously 
meant  less  by  substitution  of  the  new  phrase  than  it  means 
to  us,  the  fact  that  he  made  the  substitution  may  legitimately 
be  taken  as  a  straw  showing  the  direction  of  his  own  thought 
and  of  current  opinion.  A  change  of  cmi)hasis  was  taking 
place.  The  state  as  a  self-existent  entity  was  becoming  less 
real.  The  individual  was  becoming  relatively  both  more  real 
and  more  important. 

As  a  means  of  locating  Sonnenfels  with  reference  to  another 
important  principle,  the  opening  of  §32  is  significant,  viz.: 

The  sources  of  national  income  are  agriculture  and  industry 
[Actnsigkcit],  under  which  latter  everything  is  included  which 
increases  the  so-called  numerical  riches  [numerdren  Reichihum]  of 
a  state. 

Sonnenfels  has  been  called  the  "systematizer  of  mercan- 
tilism." Such  a  phrase  would  have  to  be  defined  very  precisely, 
and  so  as  to  remove  most  of  its  proper  meaning,  before  it  could 
be  accei)ted  as  covering  the  facts. 

There  is  no  more  vigorous  nor  progressive  passage  in  the 
three  volumes  than  the  discussion  (§§85  ff.)  of  exemptions  from 
taxation.  Sonnenfels  tersely  disi)oses  of  the  claims  to  freedom 
from  taxation  on  the  part  of  nobility,  clergy,  and  scholars 
respectively.  In  a  word,  his  argument  is:  first,  these  classes 
cither  arc  citizens  or  they  are  not;  second,  if  they  are,  this 
general  designation,  and  the  consequent  advantages  from  the 
protection  of  the  community,  carry  with  them  the  general  obliga- 
tion of  sharing  in  the  costs  of  government;  if  they  are  not 
citizens,  then  it  would  be  well  for  them  to  consider  whether 
they  would  gain  by  release  of  the  state  from  the  obligation  of 
protection  which  it  owes  to  all  citizens.  As  to  the  claim  that 
these  classes  perform  a  special  service  to  the  state,  which  entitles 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  581 

them  to  exemption,  Scnnenfels  declares  with  rather  unusual 
warmth: 

I  at  least  lay  my  hand  on  my  conscience,  in  order  to  concede 
that  the  community  could  do  without  my  writings  better  than  it 
could  dispense  with  the  labor  of  the  rustic  who  produces  our  bread 
by  the  sweat  of  his  brow.  But  I  am  treating  the  matter  more  seri- 
ously than  it  deserves.  Every  social  stratum  contributes  after  a 
certain  proportion  its  share  to  the  common  well-being.  These 
contributions  therefore  cancel  one  another,  and  the  duty  to  contrib- 
ute remains  the  completely  equal  responsibility  of  all.' 

In  the  course  of  the  discussion  of  clerical  claims  to  exemption 
from  taxation  the  author  incidentally  utters  another  opinion, 
which  may  not  properly  be  construed  as  intentionally  asserting 
all  that  would  now  be  found  in  it.  As  a  symptom,  however, 
of  the  fluid  condition  into  which  political  philosophy  was 
lapsing  it  is  decidedly  instructive.  Sonnenfels  had  shown  his 
reasons  for  concluding  that  no  claim  to  exemption  could  be 
maintained  by  the  clergy  on  the  ground  of  special  divine  right 
or  through  the  claims  of  an  external  power,  such  as  the  Roman 
court,  and  he  continues: 

The  concessions  of  princes  are  the  only  remaining  ground  for 
the  claim.  Now,  in  so  far  as  this  exemption  is  a  concession  of  the 
ruler,  it  carries  with  it,  like  every  concession  of  this  sort,  the  tacit 
qualification,  provided  the  public  welfare  is  not  too  nearly  affected 
thereby;  in  which  case  it  is  not  alone  revocable,  but  it  must  be  revoked, 
because  no  power  extends  so  far  as  to  [be  free  to]  harm  the  community 
for  the  sake  of  an  individual  or  a  class  (§91). 

Quite  as  democratic  in  form,  but  perhaps  even  more  vague 

'  A  note  refers  to  "Justi,  Staatswirth. — §407,"  with  the  comment: 
"He  is  the  only  writer  in  whom  I  remember  to  have  read  a  claim  for  this 
exception  in  the  case  of  scholars.  He  demands  it  also  for  the  clergy, 
but  for  both  only  in  the  case  of  their  personal  dues;  and  he  later  finds 
himself  obliged,  for  the  same  reasons,  to  call  for  the  same  exceptions  in 
the  case  of  all  in  the  military  and  civic  service  of  the  state." 


582  THE  CAMERALISTS 

in  application,  were  Sonnenfels'  principles  for  distributing 
the  burdens  of  taxation.     Thus  he  says: 

The  payments  of  the  individual  citizen  must  be  reckoned  accord- 
ing lo  a  double  relation:  to  his  own  means,  and  to  the  means  of 
the  other  tax-payers With  reference  to  the  former,  this  prin- 
ciple must  govern:  the  dues  must  not  be  so  great  as  to  impair  the 
eaming-power  of  the  citizen,  or  to  affect  his  courage  to  continue 
earning.  That  is,  whatever  is  necessary  to  the  continuance  of  his 
earning  must  be  free  from  tax;  e.  g.,  first,  the  necessary  support; 
second,  the  advance  [Vorsckiiss]  or  the  necessary  and  useful  outlays 
without  which  the  income  cannot  be  gained  at  all,  or  at  least  in  full; 
third,  a  portion  of  income  large  enough  to  stimulate  the  citizen  to 
continued  labor. 

In  pursuing  the  argument,  the  author  adds: 

Men  whose  hearts  are  of  steel  and  whose  temper  is  hostile  to  the 
citizens  have  tried  to  make  it  a  principle  that  a  people  will  be  the  more 

industrious,  the  more  it  is  loaded  with  taxes The  difference 

l)ctween  stimulating  and  discouraging  taxes  consists  in  this:  the 
former  increase  the  motives  for  industry,  ....  the  latter  diminish 

the  motives  to  labor Even  if  the  state  had  a  right,  therefore, 

to  extend  the  taxes  to  the  limit  of  support  and  advance,  the  self-interest 
of  the  state  would  forbid  use  of  this  right.  The  greater  sum  of  one 
year  would  be  purchased  too  dear  at  cost  of  the  deficit  of  the  following 
years  through  loss  of  energy  and  decrease  of  national  zeal  for  labor 
[Arheitsamkeit]  (§99). 

In  the  same  connection  Sonnenfels  betrays  uncertainty 
bout  the  precision  of  the  two  tests  of  taxation  which  he  has 
proposed.     Thus  he  says: 

Certain  writers  have  vcnture<l  to  define  numerically  the  fraction 
of  income  which  may  be  taken  for  taxes.  Men  of  insight  cannot 
fail  to  have  seen  the  impossibility  of  finding  such  a  general  numerical 
ratio 

In  the  following  section  another  angle  of  the  subject  is 
encountered : 

In  order  to  determine  the  ratio  of  the  payments  for  taxes  to  the 


CAMERALISTICS  Ot  SONNENl-Kl.S  583 

means  of  other  tax-payers,  this  seems  to  be  taken  for  granted  as  an 
infallible  principle,  viz..  The  portions  to  be  paid  should  be  to  each 
other  as  the  incomes  of  those  who  are  liable  to  taxation  (§100). 

That  is,  as  the  context  explains,  if  one  citizen  has  an  income 
of  100,  and  another  of  i,  the  tax  of  the  former  should  be  100 
times  that  of  the  latter.  But  Sonnenfels  at  once  points  out 
that  this  principle  cannot  be  accepted  without  modification, 
for,  "suppose  we  consider  not  the  sum  which  this  principle 
would  take  from  the  two  citizens  respectively,  but  the  sum 
which  would  be  left  to  each  after  the  payment."  The  one 
might  still  be  left  in  affluence  after  the  payment,  the  other 
might  be  crowded  below  the  means  of  subsistence,  and  the 
exact  principle  is  still  left  in  question  by  the  conclusion: 

One  sees  that  no  point  can  be  assigned  for  even  an  approximate 
comparison  of  the  abundance  of  the  one  with  the  misery  of  the 
other. 

In  the  next  paragraph  the  attempt  is  made  to  help  out  this 
vagueness  by  another  specification,  viz.: 

Nevertheless  one  must  be  fair  enough  to  admit  that  this  striking 
inequality  is  not  the  consequence  of  the  disproportion  in  the  tax,  but 
of  the  incomparability  [Unebemnasses]  of  means,  i.  c.,  of  the  differ- 
ence in  the  strata  of  civic  society,  and  that  the  demand  to  reduce  to 
equality,  by  means  of  a  finance  system,  this  difference  which,  at  least 
in  larger  states,  is  not  accidental,  would  be  senseless.  The  thing 
to  be  considered,  in  the  case  of  definition  of  the  reciprocal  relation 
between  citizens,  is  that  this  inequality  shall  not  be  increased  by  a 
disproportionate  burden  of  taxation.  This  end  will  be  approached 
as  near  as  possible  by  applying  the  following  principle:  "The  sums 
to  be  paid  shall  be  to  each  other  as  the  ncl  incomes  of  the  taxable 
citizens;  that  is,  as  the  sums  which  remain  to  each  after  subtraction 
of  support  and  advance." 

In  the  closing  section  of  the  chapter  (§104)  the  general 
marks  of  a  good  financial  system  are  summarized  as  follows: 

The  same  will  have  to  raise  the  sum  reckoned  with  reference 


584  THE  CAMERALISTS 

to  the  general  national  income  and  adequate  for  the  needs  of  the 
state,  in  so  far  as  the  domains  [Regalien]  and  accidental  revenues  do 
not  yield*  the  same  according  to  a  provincial  apportionment  cor- 
responding to  the  balance  of  money,  from  the  citizens  assessed  without 
exceptionf  in  proportion  to  their  net  incomes,  covering  short  specified 
periods,  at  the  time  which  is  least  inconvenient,  through  its  own 
system  of  collection,  which  must  be  as  simple  as  possible. 

Sonnenfels  regards  the  Regalien  as  either  essentially  taxes, 
and  to  be  treated  as  such,  or  as  auxiliaries  of  Polizey  and 
Handlung,  He  declines  to  elaborate  the  subject  therefore  on 
the  ground  that  Justi  was  strongest  at  this  point,  and  may 
be  regarded  as  the  best  authority.^ 

This  epitome  of  Sonnenfels'  views  about  finance  in  general 
contains  all  that  is  necessary  for  our  purpose  about  his  ideas 
of  taxation.  He  enters  at  some  length  into  argument  with 
the  physiocrats,  but  his  position  may  be  inferred  from  what 
has  preceded.  We  may  note  his  use  of  the  phrase,  ''die  einzige 
Abgabe"  for  the  physiocratic  Vimp6l  unique  which  has  passed 
into  the  modem  "single  tax."  We  may  also  note  that  while 
the  critique  by  which  Sonnenfels  defended  his  position  was 
quite  different  from  the  major  premises  of  the  modem  single- 
tax  argument,  his  discussion  contains  the  mdiments  of  all 
that  has  been  said  for  and  against  the  "single  tax"  as  an  expe- 
dient. 

On  the  whole,  Sonnenfels  regards  the  consumption  tax 
[Verzehrungssteuer]  as  the  least  oppressive  to  the  tax-payer, 
and  for  these  reasons: 

First,  because  it  is  in  proportion  to  earnings;  second,  because 
it  is  collected  at  the  time  when  the  citizen  has  the  means  of  payment; 
third,  because  it  is  collected  in  rates  which  the  payer  feels  less  than 
any  other  form  of  tax  (§180). 

'  Reference  is  made  to  "  Staatswirlhscha/t,  System  des  Finanrwesens 
und  seine  2  Quartbande  iiber  die  Polizey,  unter  dem  Titel:  Die  Grund- 
feste  tur  ClUckseligkeit  der  Staaten." 


CAMERALISTICS  OF  SONNENFELS  585 

A  single  quotation  from  chap,  x,  on  "Financial  Schemes," 
may  complete  our  study  of  Sonnenfels.    He  says: 

Financial  schemes  are  in  great  part  the  oflfspring  of  the  spirit 
of  selfishness,  which  clothes  itself,  however,  in  the  garb  of  zeal  for 
the  public  good.  This  must  arouse  the  distrust  of  the  financial 
administration,  and  as  the  anonymous  author  of  the  Versuchs  iiber 
die  StaalseinkUnjU  says,  always  rouse  the  more  suspicion  against  them 
the  more  they  promise.  Every  proposition  looking  to  the  improve- 
ment of  the  income  of  the  state  is  a  financial  scheme.  However 
they  may  be  dressed  up,  these  schemes  fall  into  three  classes:  I, 
those  which  propose  to  facilitate  collection,  and  incidentally  to  dimin- 
ish cost  of  collection;  H,  those  that  propose  to  increase  the  amounts 
raised  on  actually  assessed  objects;  III,  those  that  propose  to  assess 
new  objects.  Before  dealing  with  these  in  detail,  the  following  two 
observations  may  be  advanced:  I.  Every  proposition  which  promises 
no  other  advantage  than  increase  0}  public  revenues  in  general,  or  as 
the  hirelings  are  accustomed  to  express  themselves,  den  Nutzen 
des  allerhdchsten  Aerariums,  deserves  no  attentiofi.  For  the  incor- 
rectness of  the  principle,  the  public  revenues  must  constantly  be  raised, 
has  been  exposed.  A  proposition  which  aims  at  the  one-sided  advan- 
tage of  the  treasury  is  a  scheme  for  exaction.  II,  Every  pioposition 
which  promises  larger  sums  for  the  state  treasury,  in  spite  of  the 
fact  that  the  payers  are  to  pay  less,  unless  it  discovers  fraud  c-  incom- 
petence in  the  collection,  is  at  first  glance  to  be  rejected.  It  prom- 
ises a  numerical  increase  by  means  of  a  subtraction.  That  is,  it 
promises  a  monstrosity. 


CHAPTER  XXII 
SUMMARY 

1.  It  would  be  superfluous  to  argue  with  students  of  the 
social  sciences  that  German  experience  is  instructive.  What- 
ever our  opinion  of  the  purposes  which  German  polity  has 
proposed,  or  of  the  methods  by  which  the  purposes  have  been 
pursued,  the  efficiency  of  the  German  civic  system  is  beyond 
dispute.  As  an  adaptation  of  means  to  ends,  it  operates  with 
a  remarkably  low  rate  of  waste. 

2.  In  order  to  give  this  factor  of  efficiency  its  full  valuation, 
we  must  look  back  of  German  polity  to  German  political 
philosophy.  Here  too,  for  purposes  of  interpretation,  we  are 
under  no  necessity  of  approving  or  disapproving  the  German 
conception  of  the  state.  We  are  merely  bound  to  understand 
it.  Americans  cannot  interpret  German  polity  correctly  so 
long  as  we  assume  that  its  basic  thoughts  are  identical  with 
our  thoughts.  Whether  they  ought  to  be  or  not  is  beside  the 
mark.  The  Germans  have  done  what  they  have  done  while 
aiming  at  a  somewhat  diflferent  goal  from  ours,  while  assum- 
ing a  somewhat  different  social  reality  from  that  which  we 
presuppose,  and  while  consequently  applying  a  somewhat 
different  scale  of  values  to  details  of  available  ways  and  means. 

3.  In  spite  of  the  necessary  inaccuracy  of  a  brief  theorem, 
especially  when  it  is  antithetic  in  form,  the  contrast  between 
German  and  American  conceptions  of  civic  experience  may  be 
stated  approximately  as  follows:  From  the  beginning  the 
Germans  have  regarded  the  state  as  primarily  a  unit,  and  only 
secondarily  an  aggregate.  From  the  beginning  Americans  have 
regarded  the  state  as  primarily  an  aggregate,  and  only  secondarily 
a  unit.  This  contrast  is  the  necessary  starting-point  for 
American    interpretation    of    German    polity.     The    theorem 

586 


SUMMARY  587 

is  commonplace  enough  to  American  students  of  comparative 
politics.  It  is  indeed  merely  a  variation  of  the  familiar  proposi- 
tion that  German  political  theory  is  j)rimarily  collectivistic, 
while  American  political  theory  is  primarily  individualistic. 
Americans  have  not  given  all  the  attention  that  would  be 
profitable  to  the  bearings  of  this  fact  upon  valuation  of  German 
political  experience. 

If  rigid  and  consistent  logic  ruled  human  conduct,  the  fore- 
going formulas  would  not  be  as  true  as  they  are,  nor  on  the 
other  hand  would  the  degree  of  truth  in  them  have  permitted 
the  degree  of  similarity  which  actually  exists  between  individual- 
istic and  collectivistic  states.  In  all  social  affairs  we  are  dealing 
vnth  relativities,  not  with  absolutes.  We  have  to  do  with 
proportions,  and  emphases,  and  emotional  attitudes,  not  with 
fixed  quantities.  We  find  accordingly  that  there  are  certain 
collectivistic  types  of  civic  conduct,  but  they  are  by  no  means 
confined  to  states  properly  classed  as  primarily  collectivistic. 
In  certain  types  of  situations  the  most  individualistic  states,  as 
though  with  one  accord,  have  recourse  to  the  most  extreme 
types  of  collectivistic  conduct.  In  like  manner,  the  most 
collectivistic  states  tend,  in  certain  situations,  toward  individu- 
alistic types  of  conduct.  No  state,  therefore,  can  be  truly 
described  as  a  product  of  either  collectivism  or  individualism. 
Each  state  is  a  resultant  of  individualistic  and  collectivistic 
factors  in  the  mental  operations  of  its  citizens  and  of  other 
peoples.  To  use  a  different  figure,  we  may  say  that  in  Ger- 
many collectivism  has  been  the  constant  predicate,  while 
individualism  has  furnishied  the  varying  modifiers.  In  America 
individualism  has  been  the  predicate,  while  collectivism  sup- 
plied the  modifiers. 

4.  Nor  must  we  allow  ourselves  to  be  distracted  by  the 
fact  that  the  German  conception  of  the  unity  of  the  state  has 
often  lent  itself  to  perversions  which  no  theory  could  excuse. 
The  state  has  not  only  been  regarded  as  exterior  to  the  citizens, 


588  THE  CAMERALISTS 

as  above  and  beyond  them,  as  identical  with  the  government, 
but  the  government  has  sometimes  been  regarded  as  merely 
an  emanation  from  the  prince,  and  the  prince  has  been  accepted 
as  a  ruler  by  divine  right,  even  when  he  respected  no  law  that 
might  have  restrained  his  arbitrary  will.' 

We  must  remember,  on  the  other  hand,  that  individualism 
as  we  know  it  in  America  has,  in  its  turn,  too  often  degenerated 
into  license  of  some  to  invade  the  rights  of  others.  The  argu- 
ment from  perversion  cuts  about  as  deep  on  the  one  side  as  on 
the  other.  This  argument  is  insufficient  either  to  cast  down 
collectivism  or  to  set  up  individualism.  The  legitimate  con- 
clusion from  the  facts  is  that  neither  policy  is  a  self-sufficient 
principle  for  control  of  civic  action.  Neither  policy  has  been 
finally  correlated,  in  theory  or  in  practice,  with  its  necessary 
correctives.  The  purpose  of  this  book  has  not  been  to  argue 
for  the  one  policy  nor  for  the  other,  but  simply  to  summarize 
the  evidence  contained  in  the  cameralistic  books  as  to  the 
way  in  which  the  coUectivistic  idea  was  interpreted  by  the 
Germans  during  the  cameralistic  period.  This  retrospect  is  a 
necessary  preliminary  to  intelligent  interpretation  of  subse- 
quent developments  in  German  civic  theory  and  practice  down 
to  the  present. 

5.  According  to  the  cameralistic  conception  then,  the  state 
was  a  magnified  family  with  a  big  farm  as  its  property.'  The 
unity  of  this  family  with  its  estate  was  symbolized  by  the  prince. 
Its  interests  were  represented  by  the  prince  in  such  a  way 
that  no  one  could  very  clearly  discriminate  between  the  per- 
sonality of  the  prince  and  the  interests  of  the  state.  The  unity 
of  this  farm -patriarchate-principality  was  so  impressive  that 
at  first  very  little  occasion  seems  to  have  been  found  for  dis- 
tinguishing between  the  concepts  "welfare  of  the  prince,"  **wel- 

'  Vide  Inflcx,  titles  "Slate,  Theory  of,"  "Quasi-absolutism." 

'  Vide  Index,  titles  "Cameralism  as  Political  Theory  and  Practice," 
"Cameralism,  Meaning  of,"  "Cameralists,"  etc. 


SUMMARY  589 

fare  of  the  state,"  "welfare  of  the  people"  (considered  collect- 
ively), and  "welfare  of  the  people"  (considered  individually). 
It  is  approximately  true  that  the  cameralists  did  not  distinctly 
entertain  the  last  of  these  conceptions.  They  implied  it  from 
the  beginning.  They  insisted  upon  valuations  which  became 
motives  of  the  German  democratic  movement  after  the  Napo- 
leonic period.'  They  furnished  schedules  which  might  be 
adopted  as  the  programme  of  a  rather  thorough  individualism; 
yet  on  the  whole  their  theory,  as  far  as  it  was  published,  treated 
all  civic  problems  as  questions  of  situations  within  a  literal  or 
mystical  unity  of  prince  and  people.  In  the  last  analysis, 
the  knowing  and  feeling  and  willing  for  this  unity  was  to  be 
done  by  the  prince.  On  the  other  hand,  the  good  citizen  lived 
and  moved  and  had  his  being  as  a  sort  of  organ  of  a  body  whose 
center  of  consciousness  was  the  prince.* 

Of  course  the  relationship  did  not  present  itself  in  precisely 
this  form  to  the  cameralists.  We  are  expressing  it  in  our  terms, 
not  in  theirs;  yet  it  is  not  sure  that  a  single  one  among  them 
would  have  rejected  our  form  of  statement.^ 

In  general  it  may  be  said  that  political  evolution  in  Ger- 
many, as  everywhere  else,  has  been  a  variation  of  adjustments 
between  the  extreme  conceptions,  on  the  one  hand  that  the  citi- 
zens may,  can,  and  should  exist  only  as  functions  of  the  state, 
and  on  the  other  hand  that  the  state  may,  can,  and  should  exist 
only  as  functions  of  the  citizens.  The  latter  conception  was 
latent  rather  than  patent  among  the  cameralists.  It  is  not 
within  the  scope  of  this  book  to  inquire  whether  there  is  a  pos- 
sible synthesis  of  the  foregoing  thesis  and  antithesis.  We  are 
dealing  with  men  who  would  have  said,  and  after  a  fashion  did 
say,  that  the  two  views  are  mutually  exclusive. 

«  Vide  Index,  title  "Democracy,  Symptoms  of." 
»  Vide  Index,  title  "Welfare  and  Kindred  Terms." 
3  Vide  Index,  title  "Biological  Analogy."    Similar  references  might 
have  been  multiplied. 


59°  THE  CAMERALISTS 

6.  Considering  the  state  then  as  an  organism  of  which  the 
prince  was  the  head  and  (again  in  modem  idiom)  of  which 
territory  and  population  composed  the  tissues,  the  cameralists 
easily  reduced  the  questions  of  civic  polity  to  this  double 
problem:  How  may  it  he  well  with  this  state-organism  in  its 
internal  operations  and  in  its  exterfuU  relations  ?^ 

By  a  process  which  does  not  fully  appear  in  its  elements  in 
the  cameralistic  books,  the  cameralists  arrived  at  the  major 
premise  that  all  the  problems  of  "internal  and  external  se- 
curity" resolved  themselves  into  the  question  of  the  princely 
revenues.  We  must  remember  that  the  social  preconceptions 
of  the  cameralistic  period  were  thoroughly  static.  Publicists  were 
a})parently  no  more  certain  than  every  other  social  class  that  the 
human  lot  was  a  permanent  arrangement  of  social  strata.  It  was 
assumed  that  a  certain  standard  of  life  was  appropriate  to  each 
stratum,  and  that,  maintenance  of  this  standard  of  life  being 
assured,  it  would  be  impertinent  and  presumptuous  for  mem- 
bers of  any  stratum  to  long  for  satisfactions  in  excess  of  the  norm 
for  their  social  level.  If  then  the  conduct  of  the  different  strata 
of  society  could  be  so  ordered  by  the  state  that  the  total 
activities  of  the  people  could  be  made  to  result  in  an  increasing 
margin  of  material  return,  above  the  aggregate  demands  of  the 
different  class  standards,  the  state  might  appropriate  that  surplus 
without  injustice  or  hardship  to  the  individuals  This,  in  a 
word,  was  the  programme  which  the  cameralists  undertook  to 
formulate.  It  might  be  expressed  in  this  way:  Given  the 
resources  of  a  territory,  the  labor  capacity  of  the  population,  and 
the  customary  wants  of  the  different  strata,  how  may  the  state 
so  exploit  territory  and  people  that  tlie  customary  wants  may  be 
supplied,  with  an  increasing  surplus  which  may  be  claimed  as 
public  revenue  ? 

7.  Cameralism  was  accordingly  in  no  sense  an  abstract 

«  Vide  Index,  title  "Security." 

•  Vide  Index,  title  "Taxes,  Burdensome  vs.  Non-burdensome." 


SUMMARY  591 

philosophy,  except  as  every  human  action  connotes  to  the 
philosophical  onlooker  some  implied  preconceptions.  Cameral- 
ism was  an  administrative  technology.*  It  was  not  an  inquiry 
into  the  abstract  principles  of  wealth,  in  the  Smithian  sense. » 
It  was  much  more  closely  analogous  with  grub-staking  a 
prospector  or  financing  a  street  railroad.  It  was  a  theory  of 
managing  natural  resources  and  human  capacities  so  that  they 
would  be  most  lucrative  for  the  prince  in  whose  interest  the 
management  was  conducted.  To  be  sure,  just  as  any  other 
human  activity  tends  to  suggest  generalizations,  this  camera- 
listic  technology  visibly  expanded  its  conceptions  from  rule-of- 
thumb  thrift  to  somewhat  comprehensive  industrial,  commercial, 
and  political  principles.  It  even  cast  its  conclusions  occasion- 
ally at  last  in  forms  which  seemed  almost  to  anticipate  abstrac- 
tions of  the  classical  economists.  On  the  whole,  however, 
cameralism  remained  a  technology,  not  a  philosophy.  It  was 
analogous  with  the  rules  of  banking  which  one  might  learn  in 
the  course  of  practical  business.  It  was  not  like  the  philosophic 
reasoning  in  the  economic  treatises.  Not  until  the  Smithian 
influence  began  to  be  felt  in  Germany  did  questions  of  material 
ways  and  means  cease  to  be  treated  on  the  one  hand  merely  as 
matters  of  domestic  thrift,  on  the  other  hand,  merely  as  matters 
of  political  expediency.3  It  is  accordingly  a  fundamental  error 
to  treat  the  cameralistic  technology  as  a  system  of  economic 
generalizations  in  the  nineteenth-century  sense.  The  theoreti- 
cal setting  of  the  economic  ideas  was  the  paramount  political 
opportunism  of  the  period.  The  provincialisms  of  the  came- 
ralists  were  more  essentially  political  than  economic. 

8.  In  expansion  of  the  last  proposition  we  may  specify 
that  tradition  has  very  seriously  misconstrued  cameralism,  in 

'  Vide  Index,  title  "Cameralism  as  Political  Theory  and  Practice." 
«  No  one  in  the  cameralistic  series  came  as  near  to  the  Smithian 

type  of  generalization  as  several  British  predecessors  of  the  author  of 

The  Wealth  0/  Nation:. 

3  Vide  Index,  title  "Economy  and  Related  Terms." 


592  THE  CAMERALISTS 

consequence  of  treating  it  as  a  system  of  doctrines  about  nine- 
teenth-century economic  problems.  The  truth  is  that  the 
cameralists  had  not  come  within  sight  of  those  problems. 
They  were  trying  to  answer  the  questions  of  expediency  pro- 
posed to  them  by  the  political  opportunism  which  animated 
the  statecraft  of  their  period.  The  controlling  principle  of 
that  type  of  politics  was,  let  each  state  look  out  for  its  own 
interests.  This  meant  a  policy  of  readiness  for  aggression  or 
for  resistance  to  aggression.  The  foremost  consideration  was 
ways  and  means  to  protect  the  state  in  the  constant  struggle 
with  other  states.  In  this  situation  there  was  no  more  use 
for  doctrines  of  abstract  economics  than  there  was  in  the  latest 
special  session  of  Congress,  when  the  main  concern  was  not 
scientific  tariff  legislation  but  the  most  skilful  trading  of  votes 
in  the  interest  of  particular  constituencies.  The  wonder 
is  not  that  the  cameralists  held  narrow  economic  views,  but 
that  their  ideas  of  economic  relations  contained  such  a  small 
proj)orlion  of  error. 

The  supposed  economic  fallacies  of  the  cameralists  might 
be  expressed  as  details  of  the  policy  known  as  mercantilism. 
It  would  be  irrelevant  to  open  the  question  of  the  merits  or 
defects  of  the  mercantilist  policy  in  its  historical  time  and 
place.  It  would  be  futile  to  deny  that  the  cameralists  were 
mercantilists.  The  significant  fact,  however,  for  the  develop- 
ment of  the  social  sciences,  is  that  mercantilism  was  not  an 
economic  generalization  at  all,  as  we  now  understand  that 
phrase.  It  was  a  fiscal  expedient.  It  is  as  fallacious  to  infer 
fundamental  economic  doctrines  from  the  mercantilistic 
programmes  as  it  would  be  to  impute  strange  notions  of 
essentials  of  economics  to  the  American  legislators  who  prefer 
a  tariff  to  an  income  tax.*  There  is  not  a  line  in  the  cameralistic 
books  which  forbids  the  conclusion  that  their  authors  under- 

1  Vide  Index,  titles  "Mercantilism"  and  "Mercantilism,  Its  Rela- 
tions to  Cameralism." 


SUMMARY  593 

stood  as  clearly  as  the  physiocrats,  or  as  modern  economists, 
that  the  extractive  industries  are  the  ultimate  sources  of  wealth. 
The  mercantilists  did  not  differ  from  the  physiocrats  about  the 
ultimate  sources  of  wealth,  but  if  they  had  expressed  them- 
selves in  the  modern  way  they  would  have  said  that  was  "a  purely 
academic  question. "  The  real  difference  between  mercanlilisls 
and  physiocrats  was  on  fiscal  policy.  The  former  held  that  it 
was  wiser  fiscal  policy  for  governments  to  put  their  strength 
into  promotion  of  commerce  than  into  encouragement  of  the 
extractive  industries.  The  latter  insisted  on  inverting  the 
proposition.  This  disagreement  about  practical  policy  no  more 
proved  a  difference  of  opinion  about  basic  economic  relations, 
than  opposite  views  about  the  ex[)ediency  of  a  corj)oraiion  lax 
in  America  today  would  prove  that  the  o|)i)onents  believed  in 
antagonistic  systems  of  abstract  economics. 

In  particular,  it  has  been  supposed  that  the  mercantilists, 
and  especially  the  cameralists,  held  fantastic  views  of  the 
nature  of  wealth.  This  tradition  is  not  supported  by  the 
cameralistic  books.  Their  essentially  sane  assumi)tion  about 
wealth  does  not  apj)ear  more  clearly  anywhere  than  in  Justi's 
|:)ropositions.'  If  a  reader  had  heard  none  of  the  misrepre- 
sentations of  mercantilism,  however,  study  of  the  cameralistic 
books  would  impress  him  from  the  start  with  the  authors' 
sense  of  the  urgency  of  fiscal  needs;  but  he  would  find  nothing 
which  could  legitimately  be  interpreted  as  an  essentially 
different  view  of  what  constitutes  wealth  from  that  which  the 
most  enlightened  modern  economist  would  exhibit  if  he  owned 
an  elevator  full  of  corn,  but  needed  to  raise  ready  money.'' 

Less  prominent  in  the  list  of  alleged  errors  of  the  mercan- 
tilists, and  particularly  of  the  cameralists,  is  their  supposed 
misconcei)tions  on  the  subject  of  population.  It  is  frequently 
implied,  rather  than  positively  stated,  in  allusions  to  these 

'  Vide  above,  p.  339. 

>  Vide  Index,  tiiles  "Goli]  and  Silver,"  "Money,"  and  "Wealth." 


594  THE  CAMERALISTS 

writers,  that  they  supposed  increase  of  population  might  go 
on  without  limit.  In  fact,  so  far  as  they  are  to  be  judged  by 
their  books,  they  knew  as  well  as  Malthus  did  that  population 
must  always  be  in  proportion  to  the  food  supply.'  They 
believed  that  the  German  lands  were  undercultivated  and 
therefore  underpopulated.  They  believed  that  there  was  no 
immediate  prospect  of  exhausting  the  resources  of  German 
soil,  and  therefore  it  was  good  govermental  policy  to  promote 
increase  of  population  by  every  possible  means.  They  were 
no  more  guilty  of  economic  misconception  because  of  this 
judgment  than  Kansas  farmers  are  when  they  advertise  for 
laborers  from  outside  the  state  to  help  harvest  their  crops. 

But  the  gravest  of  all  the  errors  of  cameralism  is  supposed  to 
be  its  connivance  with  paternalism.  On  this  count  we  may 
as  well  confess  judgment  at  once,  but  our  plea  is  that  the  facts 
do  not  constitute  a  fault  in  the  historic  sense.  The  Germans 
three  or  four  hundred  years  ago  confronted  a  task  which  was 
hardly  less  appalling  than  that  which  Russia  is  facing  at  present. 
The  statesmen  of  the  time  saw  certain  elements  of  the  problem 
much  more  clearly  than  we  can  see  them  today.  In  a  word, 
the  great  masses  of  the  Germans  were  infants — infants  in 
knowledge,  infants  in  experience,  infants  in  feeling,  infants  in 
judgment  about  the  conduct  of  life.  They  lived  in  straightened 
circumstances.  No  affluence  of  natural  resources  stimulated 
their  ambition  and  allured  them  to  eflfort.  They  loved  the  piti- 
ful measure  of  comfort  which  they  could  command,  and  they 
were  timid,  even  if  they  were  wistful,  about  enterprises  that 
might  improve  their  condition.  How  might  the  dormant 
powers  of  these  unaroused  folk  be  awakened  and  enlisted  in 
the  task  of  making  the  most  of  themselves  and  of  their  material 
conditions  ? 

The  method  by  which  the  German  leaders  undertook  this 
task  was  something  like  the  method  by  which  a  levy  of  raw 
«  Vide  Index,  title  "Population." 


SUMMARY  595 

recruits  is  made  over  into  a  rcgiincnt  of  disciplined  soldiers. 
The  Germans  were  divided  up  into  some  hundreds  of  squads, 
each  controlled  by  a  territorial  prince  who  was  within  limits 
absolute  in  his  own  land.  This  was  of  course  not  a  scheme 
invented  out  of  hand.  It  was  a  stage  in  the  historical  evolu- 
tionary process.  The  arrangement  corresponded  to  the  condi- 
tions and  fitted  the  conditions.  Populations  largely  of  peasants, 
and  the  remainder  mostly  artisans  who  had  been  incubated  in 
the  quasi-communistic  guild  organizations,  and  had  never 
learned  to  walk  alone,  populations  politically  and  economically 
in  their  swaddling  clothes,  and  needing,  first,  nursery  care, 
then  tutors  and  governors  to  bring  them  to  maturity — this  was 
the  situation  in  which  that  paternalism  culminated  which 
Americans  have  been  taught  to  despise.  The  regime  would 
have  been  impossible  in  America,  because  of  the  difference  in 
conditions.  It  has  been  more  than  justified  by  its  results  in 
Germany. 

9.  As  was  intimated  in  the  Preface,'  the  chief  motive  for 
this  study  was  a  desire  to  find  out  whether  history  had  treated 
the  cameralists  fairly,  and  if  not  to  learn  the  lesson  of  this 
unfairness  for  methodology  in  the  social  sciences.  So  far  as 
the  facts  are  concerned,  it  is  unnecessary  to  enlarge  upon  the 
statements  in  the  Preface.  The  cameralists  have  been  mis- 
understood and  misrepresented  simply  because  their  own 
center  of  attention  was  ignored,  and  they  were  judged  as  though 
they  were  trying  to  deal  with  the  problems  which  interested 
their  critics.  The  consequence  has  l)een  that  a  series  of  writers, 
unsurpassed  by  authors  of  any  other  period  as  exhibitors  of 
the  social  forces  which  were  conducting  the  evolution  of  their 
time,  have  either  been  neglected  altogether,  or  they  have  been 
represented  as  freaks,  with  unimportant  relations  to  the  social 
process  in  which  they  occurred. 

The  cameralists  not  only  gave  voice  to  the  constructive 

'  Pp.  xxi,  xxii. 


59*^  THE  CAMERALISTS 

civic  ideas  of  an  era,  but  the  system  which  they  formulated 
contains  all  the  essentials  of  German  polity  today.  From  the 
close  of  the  cameralistic  period,  and  the  turning  of  German 
political  thinking  from  its  natural  course  by  the  Revolution  on 
the  one  hand  and  Smithism  on  the  other,  down  to  the  formation 
of  the  Verein/Ur  SocialpoliUk  in  1871,  so  many  factors  enter 
into  the  reorganization  of  German  social  science  that  it  is  easy 
to  overlook  the  permanent  cameralistic  elements.  To  under- 
stand modern  Germany  which  is  directly  and  indirectly  exert- 
ing such  manifold  influence  upon  the  whole  world,  it  is  neces- 
sary to  take  account  not  only  of  present  activities  in  Germany, 
but  of  tho.se  formative  puqjoses  and  tentative  institutions 
which  the  cameralists  represent. 

The  wider  methodological  generalization  is  that  every 
process  of  thought  has  its  telic  coefficient,  which  must  he 
accurately  computed  if  the  thought  is  to  be  objectively  esti- 
mated. In  other  words,  we  must  know  what  the  thinker  is 
consciously  or  unconsciously  trying  to  do  with  his  thought,  in 
order  to  value  it  correctly  in  the  scheme  of  intelligence. 

If  the  cameralists  had  been  trying  to  determine  the  laws  of 
wealth,  or  value,  or  distribution,  their  thinking  would  have  had 
one  force.  Since  they  were  attempting  no  such  thing,  but  were 
trj'ing  to  work  out  a  civic  technology  which  would  incidentally 
provide  for  the  necessities  of  citizens,  and  thereby  furnish  the 
prince  with  money  enough  to  pay  his  bills,  their  thinking  has 
a  quite  diflerent  force.  Historical  interpretation  of  the  cameral- 
ists not  only  turns  the  strongest  light  upon  the  later  evolution  0/ 
civic  theory  and  practice  in  Germany,  but  it  furnishes  a  typical 
case  for  illustration  0/  the  theorem  that  every  system  0/  thought 
must  he  interpreted  in  connection  with  its  peculiar  purposes. 


INDEX 


INDEX 


Absolutism.      Vide   Quasi-absolu- 

tism. 
Accidents,  public  anticipation  of, 

523- 
Adams,  H.  C,  159. 
Agriculture,  155,  187,  214,  213,  230, 

242,  283,  456  ff. 
Alexander,  530. 
Anatomiren,  114. 
Ancien  rigime,  431. 
Arbuthnot,  556  ff. 
Aristotle,  33,  210,  220,  221,  227, 

295- 
Artisanship,  promotion  of,  54. 
Attila,  334. 
Aufnahme,  300. 
August,  Elector  of  Saxony,  2,  38, 

313- 

Bacon,  511. 

Balance  of  power,  332. 

Balance  of  trade,  350,  541. 

Baumstark,  xvii. 

Bearde  de  I'Abbaye,  550. 

Beccari,  521. 

Becher,  viii,  xx,  25,   107-34,   136, 

137,  290,  484,  527,  5 28,  562. 
Beiers,  245. 
Benevolent    despotism,    78,     118, 

431.  561.  ■ 
Bentham,  485. 
Bereitestes  Vermiigen    (cf.   VernUi- 

gen),  154. 
Berch,  231. 
Bergier,  572. 

Beschriebene  Ceseize,   27,   28. 
Besold,  xviii,  132. 
Beyer,  240. 


Bielfeld,    267,    453  flf.,    2 58,    496 

504- 
Bierling,  240. 

Biological  analog)',  50,  589. 
Bluntschli,  xiii,  xiv,  xviii,  xix. 
Bode,  170,  528,  56S. 
Bornitz,  xviii,  132. 
Boter,  438. 
Botero,  133. 

British  Museum  Library,  xxv,  311. 
Brj'ce,  James,  64,  67. 
Bureaucracy,  no,  446. 

Caesar,  Julius,  402. 

Calvin,  John,  in. 

Cameralism,  as  political  theory 
and  practice,  3,  51,  54  ff.,  66,  70, 
71,  72,  74,  75.  81,  83,  86,  87, 
89,  109,  no,  145,  146,  151  ft., 
188,  197  ff.,  246,  252,  280,  282, 
293,  301  ff.,  307  ft.,  371  ff., 
376  ff.,  423,  451  ff-,  459.  476  ff-, 
591- 

Cameralism,  meaning  of,  vii,  xiv, 
1-20,  36,  43,  46,  51,  54  ff-,  69, 
73,  82  ff.,  106,  ni,  n6,  123, 
135.  156,  167,  195  ff.,  213, 
220,  224,  246,  251,  260  ff.,  272, 
277,  283,  294,  370,  394  ff.,  434. 
439.  477  ff-.  495  ff-.  503.  543  •'"■. 
555.  572,  5^8.  590,  591  f-,  595- 

Cameralists,  xi,  xiii,  xv,  xix,  xx, 
xxi,  xxiv,  6,  tS,  105,  126,  14S  ff., 
197,   280,  576,  589. 

Cameralwesen,  280. 

Cameralwissenschaft,  and  kindred 
terms,  18,  189,  21  t,  220,  222, 
227,  229,  231,  234,  235  ff., 
239,  240,  254,  236,  273,  280,  282, 
283,  297,  298,  299,  313  ff., 
37  Iff- 


599 


6oo 


THE  CAMERALISTS 


Cammer,  148,  197,  229,  269,  279, 
316. 

Capital,  concept  of,  251,  277  ff. 

Capitularies,  311. 

Carlowitz,  205. 

Casters,  569. 

Cato,  230. 

Censorship,  46. 

Census,  46. 

Chamber  sciences,  vlii. 

Charlemagne,  xiii. 

Charles  I,  325. 

Charles  V,  531. 

Child,  575. 

Chinki,  562. 

Chommcl,  245. 

Cicero,  484. 

Cohn,  14. 

Coinage,  theory  of,  52,  103. 

Colbert,  63,  133,  474,  531. 

Colbertism,  12,  13. 

Collectivism,  586,  589. 

Collegium  fundamentale,  305,  307. 

Colonies,  theory  of,  570  flf. 

Columbia  University  Library,  xxv. 

Columella,  214,  217. 

Commerce,  theory  of,  52,  in,  126, 

174,    225,    343  ff-,    376,    448  ff., 

496,  502,  525  IT.,  542  n.,  567. 
Community,  and     related     terms 

(cf.  Cemeines  Wesen),  104,  112, 

227,  228,  229,  299,  315. 
Conrad's  H andworlerbuch,  7. 
Consumption,  theory  of,  563. 
Corporation  tax,  592,  593. 
Cornell    University   Library,   xxv. 
Cossa,  viii. 
Coyer,  562,  570. 
Cromwell,  572. 
Culpepcr,  575. 
Curland,  573. 


Daniels,  W.  M.,  159. 

Darjes,  viii,  226,  267-84. 

Darwin,  490. 

Democracy,  symptoms  of,  145,  318, 

394  ff.,    485  ff-.    526,    576,    57S, 

579.  589- 
Dickinson,  108. 
Diestel,  21. 

Diminishing  returns,  98. 
Die  Kassius,  575. 
Dithmar,  viii,  106,   177,  1S6,  215, 

222-31,  235,  239,  240,  269,  296, 

297,  309.  481. 
"Divine  right,"  loi,  137. 
Dohler,  190,  199. 
Du  Fresne,  229. 
Dutot,  574. 

Eclecticism,  481  ff.,  485,  519. 

Kconomy,  and  related  terms,  xxiv, 
12,  19,  36,  49,  50,  57,  109,  113, 
126,  127,  130,  151,  172,  186,  187, 
188,  193,  195  ff.,  199  ff.,  202, 
209,  210,  211,  214,  217  ff.,  220, 
221,  222,  223,  226,  227,  22S,  231, 
235-38,  240,  241,  242  ff.,  245, 
247,  250,  253,  254,  25s,  256,  268, 
269,  270,  273,  274,  275,  276,  278, 
280,  282,  283,  288,  290,  293,  297, 
301.  305.  306,  307,  312,  316,  326, 
329,  366,  376,  437  ff.,  445,  459  ff., 
482,  483,  496,  531,  534,  544  ff-, 
548,  555,  556  ff.,  564,  59T. 

Edward  I,  516. 

Edward  VI,  574. 

F-ichhorn,  K.  F.,  64. 

Eigenlhum,  251,  477,  508,  54O. 

Eiscnhart,  41. 

Elizabeth,  511,  531. 

Encyklopedisten,  555. 

Ernst,  Herzog,  60,  62,  166,  194. 

Ethics  of  ruler,  100. 

Eudaemonism,  xx. 

Extractive  industries,   169,  205. 


INDEX 


60 1 


Fallquener,  569. 
•Ferguson,  489. 
Finanz,  149,  174. 
Finanswirthschaft,  132. 

Finanzwissenschaft,  70,   399,   437 
ff.,  453,  496,  502,  575  ff.,  578. 

Fiscalists,  6. 

Fischer,  F.,  223. 

Fischer,  P.,  244. 

FSrster,  207. 

Fond.     Vide  "Capital." 

Forbonnais,   525,   527,   565,    568, 

572,  574,  575- 
Frederick  the  Great,  63,  259,  264, 

266,  267,  268,  414,  453.  458- 
Freedom,  30,  80,  263,  330,  331, 

413  ff-,  420,  421,  467,  508,  517. 
Frensdorff,    286,    287,    289,    290, 

291,  306,  310. 
Freville,  556. 

Friederich  Wilhelm  I,  239. 
FUrstenau,  231. 
Fries,  570. 

Ganser,  527. 

Gasser,  viii,  186,  206-21,  222,  223, 

224,   227,   228,   296,    297,   309, 

481. 
Gautier,  572. 
Gehurtsbrieff,  58. 
GeUhrsamkeit,  275. 
Gemeirus  Wesen,    104,    112,    227, 

228,  229,  299,  315,  409. 

Gentzke,  240. 

Geoponica,  230! 

Georg,  Herzog,  21. 

Gerhard,   175-84,    193,    206,   248, 
296. 

Gesellscha/t,  318. 

Gesetsgebung,     as     synonym     for 

Polizey,  505. 
Gleichmann,  174. 
Getting,  556. 


Gold  and  silver,  theory  of,  131, 
157  ff.,  168,  205,  339  ff.,  347  ff-, 
448  ff.,  471  ff-,  593- 

Goldast,  565. 

Government,   forms   of,    117  ff. 

Government,  purpose  of,  88,  98, 
99,  123. 

Great  Elector,  63. 

Gross,  236. 

Grotius,  XV,  519. 

Grund/este,  167. 

Gundling,  174,  206,  238,  240. 

Hamilton,  A.,  148. 

Handlung     (cf.      "Commerce"), 

149,  496,  502,  525  flF.,  552. 
Harmenopolus,  573. 
Harvard  University  Library,  xxv. 
Haugwitz,  288,  310. 
Haushalter,  312. 
Haushaltungskunst,  109,  297,  301, 

304,  305,  316,  329,  366,  367. 
Haushaltungswesen,  227. 
Hecht,  290. 
Heeren,  xxiii. 
Hegel,  321. 
Henry  IH,  325. 
Henry  IV,  217. 
Henry  VH,  516,  568. 
Herrmann,  177. 
Hey,  484. 

Hobbes,  401,   408,   410,  492. 
Horn,  190. 

Hoffmann,  G.  A.,  225,  244. 
Hoffmann,  J.  A.,  174,  225. 
Hohberg,  245. 
Hohenthal,  187. 
Homick,  viii,  xx,  107,  129  ff.,  136, 

137,  15s,  160,  290,  527. 
Hume,  268,  488,  512  ff.,  516,  568, 

572,  575- 
Huth,  489. 


6o2 


THE  CAMERALISTS 


Ickstatt,  229. 

Inama,  40,  130,  185,  186,  206,  223. 

Individual,  concept  of,  323,  450. 

Individualism,  587,  589. 

Ingram,  ix,  556. 

Interest,  as  civic  force,  332. 

Jerusalem,  Abt,  233. 

Jesuits,  335,  336. 

Jevons,  viii. 

J6rger,  528. 

Joseph  II,  63,  483,  484,  551. 

Joseph  us,  311. 

Justi,  G.  H.,  286. 

Justi,  J.  H.  G.,  viii,  xx,  xxii,  2,  86, 
87,  91,  92,  116,  120,  146,  167, 
176,  180,  183,  199,  203,  205,  206, 
209,  225,  226,  229,  230,  248,  259, 
260,    268,    284,    285-480,    481, 

487,    496  S;    498,    503.    50s.    509, 

522  ff.,  528,  539,  551,  567,  568, 

573.  581.  593- 
Justice,    Osse's  idea   of,    32    ff.; 

Justi's  rules  of  administrative, 

337  ff- 
Justinian  Code,  574. 

Kameralwissenschaft,  a. 
Kammer,  18. 

KammeralschriftsteUer,  576. 
Kammer gericht,  2. 
Kant,  xviii,  482,  485. 
Kautz,  Julius,  ix,  xx. 
Keen,  569. 
Kerseboom,  504. 
Klenck,  170,  171. 
Klock,  viii,  34,  132. 
Klugheit,  191. 
Konigliche  Bibliothek,  xxv. 
Kolde,  62. 

Kottencamp,  260  ff.,  364. 
Kressen,  177. 
Kudler,  483. 


Landwirthschaft  {Wirth),  445,  534, 

544  ff- 
Langemack,  438. 
La  Porte,  568. 
Lau,  T.  L.,  173,  225. 
Lau,  438. 

Leib,  J.  G.,  172,  182,  190. 
Leibniz,  xviii,  287. 
Leipzig,  University  of,   31,   39. 
Leop)old  I,  63,  290. 
Lexis,  2. 
Livy,  311. 

Locke,  XV,  492,  575. 
Lohneyss,  40,  69. 
Loen,  263  ff.,  265. 
Louis  XIV,  467,  474,  573. 
Louis  XVI,  121. 
Luchese,  573. 

Ludewig,  215  ff.,    223,    233,    260, 
296. 

Luxury,  theory  of,  535  ff. 

Machiavelli,  327,  418. 

Malthusianism.     Vide  "Popula- 
tion." 

Maimbourg,  61. 

Maire,  573. 

Mahhus,  444,  50T,  594. 

Manufactures,  160  ff.,   174. 

Manufactures,   productiveness  of, 
557  ff.,  561  ff. 

Marc,  De  la,  439. 

Marchet,  G.,  xix,  xx,  136. 

Maria   Theresia,    288,    310,    311, 

468  ff.,  483  ff.,  570- 
Mark,  550. 
Marperger,  172,  190. 
Maximilian  I,  2. 

Means    {Mitlel)    (cf.     Vermogen), 

249,  251,  258. 
Meixner,  527. 
Melancthon,   22. 


INDEX 


603 


Melon,  504,  574. 

Mercantilism,  7,  8,   14,   131.  i33. 

159  ff.,  187,  265,  363,  366,  422  ff., 

456,  464,  479.   500- 
Mercantilism,  relation  to  cameral- 
ism,   10,  12,  63,  151  ff.,  159  ff-. 

580.  592- 
Mercantilists,  ix. 
Merchants,  protection  of,  570. 
Merkel,  550. 
Meusel,  267,  292. 
Mill,  J.  S.,  285,  469  ff. 
Mining,  358  ff. 
Mirabeau,  572. 
M6ser,  J.,  xviii,  63. 
Mohl,  R.  v.,  xiv,  12, 13,  242,  256, 

444,  477  ff- 
Monarchomachi,  324,  325. 
Money,    theory   of,    131,    157  ff., 

448  ff.,  471  ff-.  478  ff.,  593- 
Monopolio,  no,  128  ff.,  562. 
Montesquieu,  xv,   393,  397,  433, 

486,  505,  507,  5".  574- 
Moritz,  Herzog,  21,  22. 
Moritz  of  Sachsenzeitz,  61,  94. 
Moser,  J.  J.,  268,  284. 

Nahrung,  and  related  terms,  72, 
189,  228,  236,  250,  254,  434, 
442. 

National  management,  19. 

Nationaldkonomik,  19. 

Navigation,  value  of,  53. 

Nickols,  556,  568. 

Niebuhr,  xiii,  295. 

Oberlin,  573. 

Obrecht,  Georg,  2,  25,  34,  40  ff. 
Obrecht,  J.  T.,  42  ff.,  201. 
Obrigkeit,  and  similar  terms,   25, 

114,  116,  118,  124. 
Oekonomieau/seher,  548,  576. 
Oppenheim,  108. 


Ordnung,  30. 

Osse,  2,  21  ff.,  45,  146,  166,  206, 
208,  271. 

Palgrave,  ix. 

Pascal,  94. 

Paternalism,  446,  594. 

Penalties,  519  ff. 

Peter  I,  467. 

Philip  of  Macedon,  531. 

Philipp,  Landgrave  of  Hesse,  2,313. 

Philippi,  264  ff. 

Phlogiston  theory,  107. 

Physiocrats,  viii,  ix,  483,  568,  575, 
593- 

Pliny,  574. 

Ploetz,  64. 

Policey,  26,  28,  30,  33,  35,  37,  38, 
46,  55  ff.,  70,  74,  88,  no,  115, 
126,  149,  160,  166,  174,  202,  218, 
222,  225,  240,  253,  254,  257,  258, 
265,  269,  297,  301,  326,  329, 
376.  399,  487,  502.  505  ff- 

Policeywissenschaft,  91,  167,  224, 
226,  227,  228,  229,  231,  234,  256, 
328,  336  ff.,  495  ff.,  505. 

Political  economy  and  kindred 
terms.     Vide  "Economy." 

IIoXiTefo,  283,  284,  455. 

Political  ethics,  100,  103. 

Political  science,  and  related  terms 
(cf.  Stoats-,  etc.),  70,  no,  178, 
180,  183,  191  ff.,  209,  211,  227, 
235  ff.,  241,  305,  502. 

Politische  Hatidlungswissenscha/t, 

531- 
Poly  polio,  no,  128  ff. 

Pope,  483- 

Population,  theory  of,  15,  97,  265, 
341  ff.,  421  ff.,  444,  464  ff-. 
477  ff.,  500  ff.,  503,  531,  553  ff-, 
566,  593- 

Population,  as  norm  of  civic  wel- 
fare, 531. 


6o4 


THE  CAMERALISTS 


Porter,  569. 

Pragmatism,  275. 

Price,  theory  of,  551  ff.,  563  £f. 

Production,    and    similar    terms, 

532.  534,  551.  558- 
Property     (cf.     Vermogen),     250, 

374,  477,  546. 
Propolio,  no,  128  ff.,  562. 
Pufendorf,  xviii. 

Quasi-absolutism,  63,  73,  74,  76, 
77,  78  ff.,  88,  89,  122,  124  ff., 
137  ff.,  145, 162, 181, 194, 198  ff., 
262  ff.,  265,  320  ff.,  324,  325, 326, 
328,  373,  374,  397,  403  ff-,  40s, 
408,  412  ff.,  415  ff.,  423  ff., 
431  ff.,  466  ff.,  482,  485,  491, 
493  ff-,  495,  588- 

Ranke,  Leopold,  xii. 

Rau,  ix,  294. 

Raynal,  569,  574,  575. 

Ready  means  (cf.  "Means"),  viii, 

154,  157  ff-,  250,  441. 
Regalien,  297. 
Reichskammer,  2. 
Reichthum,    154,    156,    157  ff. 
Reimarus,  568. 
Reinking,  438. 
Religion,   civic   value  of,    474  ff., 

5iiff- 
Rentwissenschaft,  227. 
Republic,  112,  126,  181,  182,  251, 

295.  299.  317,  318,  320,  324,  409, 

468. 
Revenue,  significance  of  to  camc- 

ralists,  viii,  156  ff.,  161  £f.,  377, 

279. 
Ricardo,  489. 
Richter,  267,  268,  275. 
Rohr,   185-205,  209  ff.,  221,  222, 

227,  245,  273,  284. 
Roman  law,  300. 
Roscher,  Wilhelm,  iz,  xi,  xii,  xiii, 


xvi,  xviii,  xix,  xx,  xxii,  18,  19,  22, 
27,  61,  62,  63,  77,  83,  108,  no, 
127, 130, 132,  135,  170,  171,  172, 
173,  175,  186,  187,  207,  222,  223, 
225,  231,  232,  233,  234,  238, 
259,  263,  267,  268,  272,  273,  284, 
286,  291,  292,  310,  311,  453, 
481  ff.,  485,  487,  497,  500,  504, 
509,  519,  527,  549- 

Rossig,  xviii. 

Rousseau,  484,  490,  493. 

Rudolf  II,  43. 

Ruprecht  von  der  Pfalz,  108. 

Savery  (Savary),  245,  567. 

Savigny,  xiii. 

Sceleion  poliiicum,  114. 

Schlettwein,  556. 

Schlozer,  453. 

Schmeizel,  240. 

Schmoller,  G.,  xx,  7,  8,  lo. 

Schonberg,  205. 

Schrammer,  438. 

Schreber,  174,  223,  224,  325,  231. 

Schroder,  viii,  xx,  34,  107,  132, 
135-74,  177,  186,  189,  190,  197, 
203,  204,  205,  212,  269,  279,  290, 
361,  374,  382,  403  ff.,  452,  527. 
568. 

Schroderismus,  135. 

Seckendorff,  viii,  xx,  2,  41,  60-106, 
109,  no.  III,  119,  135,  166,  175, 
186,  190,  194,  217,  201,  212,  213, 
221,  269,  285. 

Security,  332,  334,  420,  470,  494, 
507  ff.,  517  ff.,  522  ff.,  590. 

Seligman,  E.  R.  A.,  293. 

Seminar  method,  308,  309. 

Serra,  133. 

Siegel,  575. 

Sieyfes,  413. 

Single  tax,  584. 

Smith,  Adam,  vii,  x,  3,  11,  12,  19, 
69,  84,  105,  154,  156,  167,  i68i 


INDEX 


605 


179,  204,  246,  248,  272,  285,  298, 

306,  316, 322, 366, 373, 378,  382, 

468,  483,  489,  530,  551,  564,  565, 

574,  575.  591- 
Social  concept,  112. 
Social  conditions,  duties  of  mon- 

archs  toward,  335  ff. 
Social  contract,  198,  517. 
Social  psychology,  72. 
Social  sciences,  crudeness  of,  i. 
Social  strata,  114. 
Societal ,  318. 
Sonnenfels,  viii,   2,  86,   146,   260, 

481-585. 
Spencer,  H.,  179,  300,  301. 
Spener,  94. 
Staathalter,  324. 
Stoats gelahrtheit,  177. 
Staatshaushaltung,  50. 
Staatsklugheit,  177,  178,  190,  237, 

244,  495,  530,  532- 
Staatskunst,  70,  178,  305,  327,  376, 

399,  437,  441,  453  5- 

Staatslehre,  178. 

Staatswirtschaft,  xxiv,  293  ff.,  305, 
315,  498- 

Staatswissenschaft,  xiv,  241,  494  B., 
498,  500  ff.,  503,  505. 

Sladtvnrthschaft,  no,  482. 

State,  Becher's  definition  of,  113; 
Zincke's  concept  of,  252;  Justi's 
concept  of,  323,  331,  400  ff.,  450, 
474;  Sonnenfels'  concept  of, 
490  ff.,  499,  553,  579  ff.;  Ger- 
man vs.  American  idea  of,  586, 
588,  589. 

Statecraft,  Justi's  precepts  of, 
332  ff- 

Steuart,  496. 

Stewart,  D.,  179. 

Stieda,  206,  224,  229,  231,  235,  236, 
237,  259,  268,  289,  296. 

Stinzing,  206. 


Sitsser,    106,    176,   223,    224,   225, 

238  ff. 
StoUen,  177. 
St.  Real,  496. 
Struven,  177. 
Subjects,  duties  of,  365  ff. 
Sussmilch,  504,  554. 
Suetonius,  311. 
Sully,  63,  531,  576. 
Surplus,  154  ff.,  242. 

Tacitus,  402. 

Tamerlain,  334. 

Taxation,  174,  381,  590. 

Tax-dodging,  99,  580. 

Taxes,  burdensome  vs.  non-bur- 
densome, 49,  590. 

Thorn,  229. 

Thomas,  W.  I.,  465. 

Thomasius,  22,  23  ff.,  40,  45,  166, 
171,  206,  208,  209,  210,  215,  240. 

Tillinghast,  46. 

Toussaint,  507. 

Towns,  management  of,  369  ff. 

Transportation,  by  land,  theory 
of,  572. 

Traders,  value  of,  53,  127. 

Treasury,  public,  necessity  of, 
254  ff.,  142  ff. 

Turgot,  570. 

Ueberfiuss,  154  ff. 
Usal,  575. 
Ustaritz,  574. 
Utilitarian  symptoms,  280. 
Utopia,   Schroder's,    143;    Justi's, 
42s  ff. 

Value,  theory  of,  564  ff. 

Vauban,  382,  554. 

Varro,  230. 

Velter,  439. 

Verein/ur  Socialpolitik,  596. 


6o6 


THE  CAMERALISTS 


Verfassung,  34,  70,  341,  399.  44i, 

508,  549- 
Vergesellschaftung  mil  seines  Glei- 

chen,  489,  499. 
Vergil,  230. 
Verldger,  128. 
Vermagen,  76,  250,  251,  307,  327, 

366,  367,  373  ff.,  375,  411,  440, 

532,  546. 
Villeneuve,  573. 
Vogemont,  528. 
Volkswirthschafi,  290,  483. 

Walpole,  569. 

War,  ethics  of,  99,  102. 

Warburton,  511. 

Weakh,  theory  of,  131, 154,  156  S., 

168,    171,    203  ff.,    253,   339  flf., 

422  flf.,  470,  592,  593. 

Weise,  C,   237. 

Wcitzel,  xiv. 

"Welfare," and  kindred  terms, 30, 
39.  58,  74,  86-88,  96,  112,  142, 
173, 180,  181, 194,  226,  227,  236, 
243.  244,  249.  250,  260,  262  ff.. 


2645.,  310,  319,  323,  324,  325, 
329,  404  ff.,  413,  454,  461,  490, 
492  ff.,  497  ff.,  501,  503,  524, 
526,  530  ff.,  579,  589. 

Wiegand,  556. 

Wildvogel,  177. 

Wirih,  276,  296. 

Wirthschqftslehre,  12. 

Woelnor,  550. 

Wolff,  xviii,  438,  482,  496. 

Young,  Arthur,  556. 

Zanoni,  504. 

Zedler,  186. 

Zincke,  206. 

Xenophon,  230,  284,  455. 

Zamcke,  21. 

Zimmermann,  232. 

Zincke,  14,  no,  225,  229,  232-66, 

268,  284,  297,  309,  316,  437  ff., 

439.  481. 
Zinzendorf,  108. 
Zschackwitz,  224. 
Zusamtnenjluss,  562. 


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